I 

! 


"N*\S 

* 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

AND 
Id        OTHER  STORIES 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 
AND  OTHER  STORIES 


ANNE  DOUGLAS  SEDGWICK 
(Mrs.  Basil  de  S&incourt) 

Author  of'Tantf,"  "The  Third  Window,"  (tc. 


BOSTON   AND  NEW  YORK 
HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 

SUbertfibe  Srrss  CamtirOiae 
192O 


c. 


COPYRIGHT,    1920,    BY   ANNE   DOUGLAS   DE   SELINCOURT 


ALL   RIGHTS   RESERVED 


CONTENTS 

CHRISTMAS  ROSES  I 

HEPATICAS  63 

DAFFODILS  92 

PANSIES  121 

PINK  FOXGLOVES  147 

CARNATIONS  168 

STAKING  A  LARKSPUR  208 

EVENING  PRIMROSES  253 

AUTUMN  CROCUSES  279 


CHT(ISTMAS 


I 

>HEY  were  coming  up  every 
where  in  their  sheltered  cor 
ner  on  the  wall-border,  be 
tween  the  laurustinus  and  the 
yew  hedge.  She  had  always 
loved  to  watch  their  manner 
of  emerging  from  the  wintry 
ground:  neck  first,  arched  and 
stubborn;  heads  bent  down  as  if  with  held  breath 
and  thrusting  effort;  the  pale,  bowed,  folded  flower, 
when  finally  it  rose,  still  earthy,  still  part,  as  it 
were,  of  the  cold  and  dark  from  which  it  came;  so 
that  to  find  them,  as  on  this  morning,  clear,  white, 
triumphant,  all  open  to  the  wind  and  snow,  was  to 
renew  the  sense  of  the  miraculous  that,  more  than 
any  other  flower,  they  always  gave  her.  More  than 
any  other  flower,  they  seemed  to  mean  to  come,  to 
will  and  compass  it  by  the  force  of  their  own  mys 
terious  life.  More  than  any  other  flower,  winter 
piled  upon  their  heads,  unallured  by  spring  and  the 
promise  of  sunlight,  they  seemed  to  come  from  the 
pressure  of  a  gift  to  bring  rather  than  a  life  to  seek. 
She  thought  always,  when  she  saw  them,  of  Christ 
mas  bells  over  snowy  fields,  in  bygone  centuries;  of 
the  Star  in  the  East,  and  of  the  manger  at  Bethle 
hem.  They  were  as  ancient  as  that  tradition,  aus- 


ROSES 


tere'and  immaculate'witnesses  in  an  unresponsive 
world;  yet  they  were  young  and  new,  always;  al 
ways  a  surprise,  and  even  to  her,  old  as  she  was, 
bereft  and  sorrowful,  a  reminder  that  life  was  for 
ever  a  thing  of  births,  of  gifts,  of  miracles. 

They  did  not  fail  her  this  morning  when  she 
came  out  to  them,  and  she  thought,  as  she  stopped 
to  look  at  them,  that  one  was  not  really  old  when, 
in  the  shock  of  sheer  happiness,  one  knew  child 
hood  again  and  its  wonder.  Yet,  as  she  worked 
among  them,  cutting  away  dead  leaves  and  adjust 
ing  sprays  of  evergreen  so  that  the  rains  should  not 
splash  them  with  mud,  it  was  a  new  analogy  they 
brought;  and,  for  the  first  time,  measuring  her  re 
source  after  the  appeal  Tim's  letter  had  made  upon 
it,  she  reflected  that  the  Christmas  roses  were 
rather  like  herself.  She,  too,  in  this  wintry  season 
of  her  life,  was  still  determined  and  indomitable. 
Widowed  and  childless,  with  many  mournings  in 
her  heart,  griefs  and  devastations  in  her  memory, 
she,  too,  was  a  force,  silent  and  patient;  and  it  was 
this  that  people  still  found  in  her.  For  the  appeal 
always  brought  the  answer.  She  had  felt  herself,  so 
often,  benumbed  into  lethargy,  and,  yielding  to  the 
mere  mute  instinct  of  self-preservation,  had  so 
often  folded  herself  up  and  lapsed  into  the  blank 
darkness  of  her  grief  (her  husband's  death,  so 
many  years  ago;  and  Miles's,  and  little  Hugh's, 
and  her  dear,  dear  Peggy's).  But  it  had  always 
been  to  hear  herself,  as  if  in  a  dream,  called  to  from 
the  outside  world,  and  to  feel  herself,  in  answer, 
coming  up  again,  rising,  if  only  to  snows  and  tem 
pests,  in  a  renewal  of  life  which  brought  with  it, 
always,  a  renewal  of  joy  in  life. 

For  months  now,  since  August,  she  had  been 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

sunken  in  the  last  grief  —  it  must  be  —  that  could 
come  to  her;  for  Miles  was  the  last,  of  her  own,  who 
had  remained  —  Peggy's  youngest  boy.  The  old 
est,  already  a  soldier,  had  been  killed  in  the  first 
months  of  the  war,  and,  after  all  his  years  of  peril, 
it  had  seemed  as  if  Miles  was  to  escape.  But,  cru 
elly,  just  at  the  turning  of  the  tide,  when  victory 
had  become  assured,  he  had  been  shot  down,  and  in 
his  crashing  fall  through  the  air  she  had  felt  the  end 
of  everything,  Peggy  dying  again  with  him;  for 
Peggy,  too,  had  died  like  that,  crashing  and  falling 
and  dragged,  in  a  horrible  hunting  accident.  There 
seemed,  now,  nothing  more  left  to  suffer,  and  noth 
ing  more  to  live  for,  either,  unless  it  were  her  poor 
Tim;  and  it  had,  exactly,  been  Tim's  letter  that  had 
driven  her  out  to  wrestle  with  the  elements,  after 
her  wont  in  any  disturbance  or  perplexity,  so  that 
she  could  think  over  what  he  told  her  while  she 
wielded  her  trowel  and  fork  on  the  convenient 
wall-border. 

She  had,  on  rising  from  the  breakfast-table,  sent 
Tim  a  wire:  "I  shall  expect  her.  Writing  later," 
and  had  then  called  to  Parton  to  bring  her  old 
warm  coat,  her  hood  with  its  satin  lining,  and  her 
buckled  galoshes. 

Parton  was  accustomed  to  her  mistress's  vaga 
ries  in  regard  to  gardening,  and  made  no  comment 
on  the  enterprise  except  to  express  the  hope  that 
it  would  not  snow  again.  Parton,  in  spite  of  her 
youth  a  most  efficient  combination  of  parlour 
maid  and  lady's-maid,  was  devoted  to  her  mis 
tress;  the  little  pat  and  tweak  she  gave  to  the  bow 
of  the  hood,  and  the  gentleness  with  which  she  ad 
justed  the  galoshes,  expressed  a  close  yet  almost 
reverential  relationship. 

[3  ] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

It  was  not  freezing,  and  under  the  light  fall  of 
snow  the  ground  was  soft.  Mrs.  Delafield  found 
herself  enjoying  the  morning  freshness  as  she  tidied 
and  weeded,  and  had  her  usual  affectionate  eye  for 
the  bullfinches  nipping  away  at  her  plum-buds  and 
the  tits  and  robins  at  the  little  table  spread  with 
scraps  for  them  near  the  house;  while  all  the  time 
Tim's  letter  weighed  on  her,  and  the  problem  it 
presented;  and  as  she  pondered  on  it,  and  on 
Khoda,  her  niece,  Tim's  only  child,  her  firm, 
square,  handsome,  old,  white  face  was  not  devoid  of 
a  certain  grimness. 

Mrs.  Delafield  was  very  handsome,  perhaps 
more  handsome  now  than  she  had  been  in  youth. 
Her  brow,  with  the  peak  of  thick  white  hair  de 
scending  upon  it,  her  thick  black  eyebrows  and  her 
rather  thick,  projecting  nose,  were  commanding  — 
almost  alarmingly  so  to  those  who  in  her  presence 
had  cause  for  alarm.  The  merely  shy  were  swiftly 
reassured  by  something  merry  in  her  gaze  and  by 
the  benevolent  grace  still  lingering  on  her  firm, 
small  lips.  She  had  square  eyes  clearly  drawn,  and 
with  an  oddity  in  their  mountain-brook  colouring, 
for  one  was  brown  and  one  was  freaked  with  grey. 
Her  form  was  ample  and  upright,  and  in  all  hef 
gestures  there  was  swiftness  and  decision. 

It  was  of  Tim  she  thought  at  first,  rather  than  of 
Rhoda,  the  cause  of  all  their  distresses.  But  she 
was  not  seeing  Tim  as  he  now  existed,  bleached, 
after  his  years  of  India,  invalided,  fretted  by  fam 
ily  cares,  plaintive  and  pitiful.  She  saw  him  as  a 
very  little  boy  in  their  distant  Northern  nursery  of 
sixty  years  ago,  with  bright  curls,  ruddy  cheeks, 
and  the  blue  eyes,  candid  and  trusting,  that  he  still 
kept;  standing  there,  bare-armed  and  bare-legged, 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

in  his  stiff,  funny  little  dress  of  plaid,  before  the 
fire-guard,  while  nurse,  irate,  benevolent  figure, 
cut  bread  and  butter  for  breakfast.  Dear  little 
Tim!  still  her  younger  brother;  still  turning  to  her, 
as  he  had  always  done,  for  counsel  or  succour  in 
any  stress  or  anxiety.  It  was  nothing  new  that  the 
anxiety  should  be  about  Rhoda;  there  was  nothing, 
even,  that  had  surprised  her  in  Tim's  letter;  yet 
she  knew  from  the  sense  of  urgency  and  even 
breathlessness  within  her  that  the  blow  which  had 
been  dealt  him  could  not  leave  her  unaffected.  She 
could,  after  all,  still  suffer  in  Tim's  suffering.  And 
even  before  she  had  let  her  thoughts  dwell  deci 
sively  on  Rhoda,  she  had  found  herself  thinking, 
while  the  grimness  settled  on  her  face,  "I  shall 
know  how  to  talk  to  her." 

She  had  always  known  how  to  talk  to  the  moody 
young  beauty;  that  was  why  Tim  had  sent  off  this 
letter  of  desperate  appeal.  She  never  quite  saw 
why  Rhoda  had  not,  from  the  first,  felt  in  her 
merely  an  echo  of  her  father's  commonplace  con 
ventionality  and  discounted  her  as  that.  Rhoda 
had  never,  she  felt  sure,  guessed  how  far  from  con 
ventional  she  was;  how  much  at  heart,  in  spite  of  a 
life  that  had  never  left  appointed  paths,  she  knew 
herself  to  be  a  rebel  and  a  sceptic;  no  one  had  ever 
guessed  it.  But  there  had  always  been  between  her 
and  Rhoda  an  intuitive  understanding;  and  that 
Rhoda  from  the  first  had  listened  and,  from  the 
first,  had  sometimes  yielded,  proved  that  she  was 
intelligent. 

Mrs.  Delafield  saw  herself  so  accurately  as 
Rhoda  must  see  her.  The  terse,  old-fashioned 
aunt  in  the  country  residence  —  yes,  dear  Fern- 
leigh,  square  and  mid-Victorian,  with  its  name,  and 

(si 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

its  creepers,  its  conservatory,  and  its  shrubberies, 
was  so  eminently  a  residence;  and  she  had  never 
wanted  to  alter  it  into  anything  else,  for  it  was  so 
that  she  had  found  it  when,  on  her  mother-in-law's 
death,  she  and  the  young  husband  of  so  many 
years  ago  had  first  gone  there  to  live.  Rhoda  must 
see  her,  her  hair  so  smooth  under  its  cap  of  snowy 
net,  her  black  gowns  —  stuff  for  morning  wear, 
silk  for  evening  —  so  invariable,  with  the  frills  at 
neck  and  wrists,  thick  gold  chains  and  the  dim  old 
brooches  that  went  with  them,  as  belonging  almost 
to  an  epoch  of  albums  on  centre-tables,  of  Mendels 
sohn's  sacred  songs,  and  archery  tournaments;  an 
epoch  of  morning  family-prayers  and  moral  cate 
gories,  where  some  people  still  believed  in  hell  and 
everybody  believed  in  sin.  She  did  n't  think  that 
Rhoda  had  ever  seen  through  all  these  alienating 
appearances  to  the  reality  she  herself  knew  to  be  so 
different;  but  it  had  always  been  evident  that  she 
felt  it  through  them;  that  she  was  at  ease  with  her 
aunt,  candid,  even  if  angry,  and  willing,  even  when 
most  silent  and  recalcitrant,  to  come  down  to 
Fernleigh,  when  her  distracted  parents  could  deal 
with  her  no  longer,  and  to  "  think  things  over,"  as 
they  put  it  to  her,  imploringly. 

Mrs.  Delafield  could  see  Rhoda  thinking  things 
over  from  a  very  early  age,  from  the  earliest  age  at 
which  recalcitrancy  could  count  asv  practically 
alarming.  She  could  see  her  walking  slowly  past 
this  very  border  at  the  time  that  she  had  deter 
mined  to  go  on  the  stage,  —  she  had  only  just  left 
the  hands  of  her  devastated  governesses,  —  paus 
ing  now  and  then  to  examine  unseeingly  a  plant, 
her  hands  clasped  behind  her,  her  dark,  gloomy, 
lovely,  young  head  brooding  on  the  sense  of  wrong, 

[6] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

and,  even  more,  no  doubt,  on  plots  and  stratagems. 
Her  aunt  had  always  watched  her,  while  seeming, 
in  the  most  comfortable  manner  possible,  to  give 
her  no  attention;  noting  everything  about  her,  — 
and  everything  counted  against  poor  Tim's  and 
Frances's  peace  of  mind,  —  from  the  slender, 
silken  ankles  to  the  tall  column  of  the  proud  young 
throat;  all  of  it,  every  bit  of  Rhoda,  so  determined 
by  an  insatiable  vanity,  which  was  the  worst  of  her, 
and  by  a  sardonic  pride,  which  was  the  best. 

Rhoda,  to  do  her  further  justice,  was  even  more 
wonderful  in  the  eyes  of  her  admirers  than  in  her 
own.  Her  consciousness  was  not  occupied  so  much 
with  her  own  significance  as  with  all  the  things  due 
to  it;  and  it  was  upon  these  things,  and  the  methods 
of  obtaining  them,  that  she  brooded  as  she  walked. 
"Naughty  girl,"  had  been  her  aunt's  unexpressed 
comment;  and  perhaps  one  reason  why  Rhoda  had 
found  it  comfortable,  or,  at  least,  composing,  to 
be  with  her,  was  that  it  was  a  relief  to  be  seen  as  a 
naughty  girl  rather  than  as  a  terrifying  portent. 

Mrs.  Delafield  had  determined  at  once  that 
Rhoda  should  not  go  on  the  stage,  though  not, 
really,  because  Tim  and  Frances  had  begged  her  to 
dissuade  the  child.  She  could  perfectly  imagine 
having  wished  to  go  on  the  stage  herself  in  her 
young  days;  and  it  was  this  consciousness,  perhaps, 
that  made  her  so  fair  to  Rhoda's  desire.  She  had 
taken  her  stand  on  no  conventional  objection;  she 
had  not  even  argued  with  Rhoda;  she  had  simply 
been  able  to  make  her  feel,  bit  by  bit,  that  she 
had  n't  one  little  atom  of  talent. 

It  had  been  the  same  thing,  really,  when  Rhoda 
had  announced  her  intention  of  marrying  a  dread 
ful  young  man,  a  bad  young  man,  —  Mrs.  Dela- 

[7] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

field  knew  where  to  apply  her  categories,  —  who 
had  a  large  studio  where  he  gave  teas  and  painted 
small,  disagreeable  pictures.  They  were  clever 
pictures;  Mrs.  Delafield  was  aware  of  this,  though 
Tim  and  Frances  saw  them  only  as  disagreeable; 
and  the  young  man,  if  bad,  was  clever.  Mrs.  Dela 
field  had  travelled  up  to  town  several  times  in  this 
emergency,  and  had  even  accompanied  Rhoda  to 
the  studio,  where  a  young  lady  with  bare  legs  and 
feet  was  dancing,  with  more  concentration  than 
spontaneity,  before  a  cigaretted  audience.  Oddly 
enough,  after  this  visit,  it  had  been  much  easier  to 
make  Rhoda  give  up  Mr.  Austin  Dell  than  it  had 
been  to  make  her  give  up  the  stage.  Mrs.  Delafield 
had  merely  talked  him  over,  very  mildly,  him  and 
his  friends,  asking  here  and  there  a  kindly  question 
about  one  or  a  slightly  perplexed  question  about 
another.  It  had  been  Rhoda  herself  who  had  ex 
pressed  awareness  of  the  second-rate  flavour  that 
had  brooded  so  heavily  over  dancer  and  audience, 
not  leaving  Mr.  Dell  himself  untouched.  On  the 
point  of  Mr.  Dell's  income  Mrs.  Delafield  soon  felt 
that  Rhoda  knew  misgivings  —  misgivings  as  to 
her  own  fitness  to  be  a  needy  artist's  wife.  She 
made  no  overt  recantation,  but  over  her  tea,  pres 
ently,  agreed  with  her  aunt  that  it  was  a  pity  to 
dance  with  bare  feet  unless  the  feet  were  flaw 
lessly  well-shaped.  "She  is  such  a  little  fool,  that 
Miss  Matthews  I"  Rhoda  had  remarked.  And  af 
ter  this  there  was  no  more  talk  of  Mr.  Dell. 

II 

WHEN,  in  the  second  year  of  the  war,  poor  Tim  and 
Frances,  dusty,  jaded,  nearly  shattered,  but  ap- 

[8] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

peased  at  last,  were  able  to  announce  the  engage 
ment  of  their  daughter  Rhoda  to  the  unexception 
able  Niel  Quentyn,  Mrs.  Delafield's  special  func 
tion  seemed  ended;  but,  looking  back  over  her  long 
intercourse  with  her  niece,  she  knew  that  Rhoda 
had  felt  her  a  relief  rather  than  an  influence;  that 
she  had  made  things  easier  rather  than  more  diffi 
cult  to  her;  that,  in  short,  she  had  always  success 
fully  appealed  to  the  girl's  intelligence  rather  than 
to  what  poor  Tim  and  Frances  called  her  better 
self;  and  it  was  of  Rhoda's  intelligence,  and  of 
what  possible  pressure  she  might  be  able  to  bring 
to  bear  upon  it,  that  she  thought  finally,  as  she 
worked  at  her  border  and  waited  for  the  fly  that 
was  to  bring  Rhoda's  baby  and  its  nurse  from  the 
station. 

She  had  not  been  able  to  rejoice  with  her  brother 
and  his  wife  over  Rhoda's  match.  She  who  had 
measured,  during  her  years  of  acquaintanceship 
with  her,  her  niece's  force,  had  measured  accu 
rately,  in  her  first  glance  at  him,  Niel's  insignifi 
cance.  He  was  good-looking,  good-tempered,  and 
very  much  in  love;  but  caste,  clothes,  code,  and  the 
emotion  of  his  age  and  situation  summed  him  up. 
He  had  money,  too,  and  could  give  Rhoda,  to 
gether  with  a  little  handle  to  her  name,  the  dim, 
rich,  startling  drawing-room  in  which  her  taste  at 
once  expressed  itself,  and  a  pleasant  country  house, 
where,  as  he  confided  to  Mrs.  Delafield,  he  hoped 
to  inspire  her,  when  the  war  was  over,  with  his  own 
ardour  for  hunting. 

Rhoda  was  far  too  clever  to  quarrel  with  such 
excellent  bread  and  butter;  but  what  could  he  give 
her  more?  for  Rhoda  would  want  more  than  bread 
and  butter;  what  food  for  excitement  and  adven- 

[9] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

ture  could  he  offer  her  indolent  yet  eager  mind  and 
her  nature,  at  once  so  greedy  and  so  fastidious? 
Mrs.  Delafield  asked  herself  the  question,  even 
while  she  watched  Rhoda's  wonderful  white  form 
move  up  the  nave  at  her  splendid,  martial  wed 
ding;  even  while  poor  Frances  wept  for  joy  and 
"The  Voice  that  breathed  o'er  Eden"  surged  from 
the  organ;  and  she  feared  that  Niel  was  getting  far 
more  than  he  had  bargained  for  and  Rhoda  far 
less. 

The  first  year,  it  was  true,  passed  successfully. 
Poor  Frances,  who  had,  fortunately,  died  at  the 
end  of  it,  had  known  no  reason  for  abated  rejoic 
ing.  She  lived  long  enough  to  see  the  baby,  little 
Jane  Amoret,  as  Rhoda  persisted  in  calling  the 
child;  and  she  had  welcomed  Niel  home  once  on 
leave  —  Niel  as  much  infatuated  as  ever  and  try 
ing  to  take  an  intelligent  interest  in  Picasso.  It 
was  since  then,  during  the  past  year,  that  Tim's 
letters  had  expressed  a  growing  presage  and  ap 
peal.  Moved  by  the  latter,  and  only  a  short  time 
before  her  own  grief  had  overtaken  her,  she  had 
gone  up  to  London  and  stayed  with  him  for  a  few 
days,  and  had  taken  tea  with  Rhoda. 

At  Rhoda's  it  had  been  exactly  as  she  expected. 
The  drawing-room  was  worthy  of  its  fame;  so 
worthy  that  Mrs.  Delafield  wrondered  how  Niel 
afforded  it  —  and  in  war-time,  too.  Rhoda,  as  she 
often  announced,  was  clever  at  picking  up  things, 
and  many  of  the  objects  with  which  she  had  sur 
rounded  herself  were  undoubted  trophies  of  her 
resource  and  knowledge.  But  all  the  taste  and 
skill  in  the  world  did  n't  give  one  that  air  of  per 
vading  splendour,  as  of  the  setting  for  a  Russian 
ballet,  in  which  the  red  lacquer  and  the  Chinese 

[  10] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

screens,  the  blacks  and  golds  and  rich,  dim  whites 
were,  like  Rhoda  herself,  sunken  with  her  custom 
ary  air  of  gloomy  mirth  in  the  deepest  cushions 
and  surpassingly  dressed,  merged  in  the  soft,  un 
stressed,  yet  magnificent  atmosphere.  It  was  the 
practical  side  of  matters  —  the  depth  of  good,  dull 
NiePs  purse  measured  against  the  depth  of  Rhoda's 
atmosphere  —  that  alarmed  Mrs.  Delafield,  rather 
than  Rhoda  herself  and  Rhoda's  friends,  of  whom 
poor  Tim  had  so  distressingly  written. 

There  were  many  suave  and  merry  young  men, 
mainly  in  khaki,  and  various  ladies,  acute  or  lan 
guorous,  who  had  the  air  of  being  as  carefully  se 
lected  as  the  chairs  and  china.  There  were  tea  and 
cigarettes,  and  an  abundance  of  wonderful  talk 
that  showed  no  sign  of  mitigation  on  account  of  her 
mid-Victorian  presence;  though,  as  Mrs.  Delafield 
reflected,  musing  on  the  young  people  about  her, 
no  one  could  say,  except  their  clever  selves,  how 
much  mitigation  there  might  not  be.  Like  Rhoda, 
no  doubt,  they  felt  her  reality  through  her  mid- 
Victorianism.  Her  small  black  bonnet  with  its  vel 
vet  strings,  and  her  long,  loose  jacket  trimmed  with 
fringe,  would  not  restrain  them  beyond  a  certain 
point.  Yet  she  suspected  that  they  had  a  point,  and 
she  wondered,  though  the  question  did  not  alarm 
her,  where  it  could  be  placed. 

They  talked,  at  all  events,  and  she  listened;  at 
times  she  even  smiled;  and  since  by  no  possibility 
could  her  smiles  be  taken  as  complicities,  she  was 
willing  that  they  should  be  taken  as  comprehen 
sions.  Rhoda's  friends,  though  so  young,  were  chill 
and  arid,  and  the  enthusiasms  they  allowed  them 
selves  had  the  ring  of  provocation  rather  than  of 
ardour.  Yet  she  did  not  dislike  them;  they  were 

in] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

none  of  them  like  Mr.  Dell;  and,  though  so  with 
ered  by  sophistication,  they  had  at  moments 
flashes  of  an  uncanny,  almost  an  ingenuous  wis 
dom. 

The  occasion  had  not  alarmed  her,  and  she  had 
found  but  one  moment  oppressive,  that  of  the  ap 
pearance  —  the  displayal,  as  of  a  Chinese  idol,  in 
deed,  or  a  Pekinese  spaniel  (Rhoda  had  three  of 
these)  —  of  poor  little  Jane  Amoret.  She  rarely 
disliked  her  niece,  even  when  feeling  her  most 
naughty;  but  she  found  herself  disliking  her  cal 
culated  maternity,  with  its  kisses,  embraces  and 
reiterated  "darlings."  Jane  Amoret  had  eyed  her 
gravely  and,  as  gravely,  had  held  out  her  arms  to 
heyr  nurse  to  be  taken  back  when  the  spectacle  was 
over.  Jane  Amoret's  attire  was  quite  as  strange  as 
her  mother's  drawing-room,  and  Rhoda  had  con 
trived  to  make  her  look  like  a  cross  between  an 
Aubrey  Beardsley  and  a  gorgeous,  dressed-up  doll 
Madonna  in  a  Spanish  cathedral. 

On  returning  to  Tim,  Mrs.  Delafield  found  that 
she  could  not  completely  reassure  him,  but  she  laid 
stress,  knowing  it  would  be,  comparatively,  a  com 
fort,  on  Rhoda's  extravagance,  eliciting  from  him  a 
groan  of  "I  know!  —  I  know!  —  Poor  Niel's  been 
writing  to  me  about  it!  —  Dances;  dinners;  gowns. 
One  would  say  she  had  no  conscience  at  all  —  and 
at  a  time  like  this!"  But  he  went  on,  "That's 
nothing,  though.  That  can  be  managed  when  Niel 
gets  back  —  if  he  ever  does,  poor  fellow!  —  and 
can  put  his  foot  down  on  the  spot.  You  did  n't  see 
him,  then?  He  was  n't  there  —  the  young  man?" 

Tim  had  never  before  spoken  definitely  of  a 
young  man. 

"The  young  man?"   she  questioned.    "There 

[  12] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

were  a  dozen  of  them.  Of  course,  she'll  have  a 
special  one:  that's  part  of  the  convention.  Rhoda 
may  cultivate  —  like  all  the  rest  of  them  —  every 
appearance  of  lawless  attachment;  but  you  may  be 
sure,  dear  Tim,  that  it's  only  a  pose,  a  formula,  like 
the  painted  lips  and  dyed  hair,  which  does  n't  in 
the  least  mean  they  are  demi-mondaines." 

"Painted  lips?  Dyed  hair?  Demi-mondaines?" 
Tim  had  wanly  echoed.  "Do  you  really  mean,  Isa 
bel,  that  Rhoda  paints  and  dyes?" 

"Not  her  hair.  It's  too  lovely  to  be  dyed.  But 
her  lips,  —  why,  have  n't  you  seen  it?  —  ever  since 
she  was  eighteen.  It  is  all,  as  I  say,  a  pose;  a  for 
mula.  They  are  all  afraid  of  nothing  so  much  as  of 
seeming  respectable.  I  imagine  that  there's  just  as 
much  marital  virtue  at  large  in  the  world  nowa 
days  as  when  we  were  young.  —  Who  is  the  young 
man?"  she  had,  nevertheless,  ended. 

"My  dear,  don't  ask  me!"  Tim  had  moaned, 
blanched  and  battered  in  his  invalid's  chair.  (Why 
would  n't  he  come  down  and  live  with  her?  Why, 
indeed,  except  that,  since  Frances's  death,  he  had 
felt  that  he  must  stand  by,' in  London,  and  watch 
over  Rhoda.)  "I  only  know  what  I've  heard. 
Amy  has  talked  and  talked.  And  everybody  else  is 
talking,  according  to  her."  Amy  was  Frances's 
sister,  a  well-meaning,  but  disturbing  woman,  with 
a  large  family  of  well-conducted,  well-married,  un- 
painted,  and  unfashionable  daughters.  "She  is 
here  every  day  about  it.  They  are  always  together. 
He  is  always  there.  The  poet  —  the  new  young 
poet.  He  has  a  heart  or  a  chest  or  a  stomach  - — 
something  that  has  sent  him  home  and  that  keeps 
him  safe  at  Whitehall,  while  poor  Niel  fights  in 
France.  Surely,  Isabel,  you've  heard  of  Christo- 

1 13 1 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

pherDarley?  Was  n't  he  there?  Young.  Younger 
than  Rhoda.  Black  hair.  Big  eyes.  Silent." 

Silent.  —  Yes,  there  had  been,  beside  Jane  Am- 
oret,  one  silent  person  in  Rhoda's  drawing-room. 
And  she  had  been  aware  of  him  constantly,  though, 
till  now,  unconsciously.  Very  young;  very  pale; 
aloof,  near  a  window,  with  an  uncalculated  aloof 
ness.  She  reconstructed  an  impression  that  became 
deeper  the  further  she  went  into  it.  Thick  back 
ward  locks  that  had  given  his  forehead  a  wind-blown 
look,  and  a  gaze  now  and  then  directed  on  herself, 
a  gaze  grave,  withdrawing,  yet  scrutinizing,  too. 

"Yes;  I  think,  now  that  you  describe  him,  I 
must  have  seen  him,"  she  murmured;  while  a  curi 
ous  alarm  mounted  in  her,  an  alarm  that  none  of 
Rhoda's  more  characteristic  circle  had  aroused. 
"He  was  n't  living  by  a  formula  of  freedom,"  she 
reflected.  "And  he  was  n't  arid."  Aloud  she  said, 
"He  looked  a  nice  young  creature,  I  remember." 

"He  writes  horrible  poems,  Amy  says;  blasphe 
mous.  There  they  are.  I  can't  understand  them. 
He  casts  down  everything;  has  no  beliefs  of  any 
kind.  Nice?  I  should  think  that's  the  last  adjec 
tive  that  would  describe  him." 

She  had  picked  up  the  unobtrusive  volume  and 
found  herself  arrested;  not  as  she  had  been  by  the 
memory  of  the  young  man's  gaze,  nor  yet  in  the 
manner  that  Tim's  account  indicated;  but  still  ar 
rested.  Very  young  —  but  austere,  dignified,  and 
strange,  genuinely  and  effortlessly  strange.  So  a 
young  priest  might  have  written,  seeking  in  close- 
pressed  metaphysical  analogies  to  find  expression 
for  spiritual  passion.  She  stood,  puzzled  and  ab 
sorbed. 

"No,  it  is  n't  blasphemous,"  she  said  presently. 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

"And  he  has  beliefs.  But  surely,  Tim  dear,  surely 
this  young  man  can't  care  for  Rhoda." 

How  could  a  young  man  who  wrote  like  that 
about  the  mystic  vision  care  for  Rhoda? 

"  Not  care  for  Rhoda ! "  Tim's  voice  had  now  the 
quaintest  ring  of  paternal  resentment.  "The  most 
beautiful  young  woman  in  London!  Why,  he's 
head  over  heels  in  love  with  her.  And  the  worst  of 
it  is  that,  from  what  Amy  sees  and  hears,  she  cares 
for  him." 

"It's  curious,"  Mrs.  Delafield  said,  laying  down 
the  book.  "I  should  n't  have  thought  he'd  care 
about  beautiful  young  women." 

And  now  Tim's  letter,  on  this  December  morn 
ing,  announced  that  Rhoda  had  gone  off  with 
Christopher  Darley;  and  Mrs.  Delafield  could  find 
it  in  her  heart,  as  she  worked  and  pondered,  to 
wish  that  her  dear  Tim  had  followed  Frances  be 
fore  this  catastrophe  overtook  him. 

"Good  heavens!"  she  heard  herself  muttering, 
"if  only  she'd  been  meaner,  more  cowardly,  and 
stayed  and  lied  —  as  women  of  her  kind  are  sup 
posed  to  do.  If  only  she'd  let  him  die  in  peace;  he 
can't  have  many  years." 

But  no:  it  had  been  done  with  le  beau  geste.  Tim 
had  known  nothing,  and  poor  Niel,  home  for  his 
first  peace  leave,  had  come  to  him,  bewildered 
and  aghast,  with  the  news.  He  had  found  a  letter 
waiting  for  him,  sent  from  the  country.  Tim 
copied  the  letter  for  her:  — 

DEAR  NIEL: 

I  'm  sure  you  felt,  too,  that  our  life  could  n't  go  on. 
It  had  become  too  unsatisfactory  for  both  of  us. 
Luckily  we  are  sensible  people  nowadays,  and  such 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

mistakes  can  be  remedied.  You  must  mend  your 
life  as  I  am  mending  mine.  I  am  leaving  you>  with 
Christopher  Darley.  I  am  so  sorry  if  it  seems  sud 
den;  but  I  felt  it  better  that  we  should  not  meet 
again. 

Yours  affectionately 

RHODA 

"If  only  the  poet  had  n't  had  money,  too!" 
Mrs.  Delafield  had  thought.  For  this  fact  she  had 
learned  about  Mr.  Darley  in  London.  Rhoda 
would  never  have  abandoned  that  drawing-room 
had  she  not  been  secure  of  another  as  good. 

Tim  wrote  that  nothing  could  have  been  man 
lier,  more  generous,  than  NiePs  behaviour.  He  was 
willing,  for  the  sake  of  the  child,  to  take  Rhoda 
back,  reinstate  her,  and  protect  her  from  the  con 
sequences  of  her  act;  and  what  Tim  now  begged  of 
his  sister  was  that  she  should  see  Rhoda,  see  if, 
confronting  her,  she  could  not  induce  her  to  return 
to  her  husband.  Meanwhile  Jane  Amoret  would  be 
dispatched  at  once  with  her  nurse  to  Fernleigh. 
Tim  had  written  to  his  child  in  her  retreat,  and  had 
implored  her  to  go  to  her  aunt.  "I  told  her  that 
you  would  receive  her,  Isabel,"  so  Tim's  letter 
ended;  "and  I  trust  you  now  to  save  us  • —  as  far  as 
we  can  be  saved.  Tell  her  that  her  husband  will 
forgive,  and  that  I  forgive,  if  she  will  return.  Let 
her  see  the  child.  Let  that  be  your  appeal." 

Poor,  darling  Tim  I  Very  mid-Victorian.  "For 
give."  Would  "receive"  her.  The  words  had  an  an 
tediluvian  ring.  With  what  battledore  and  shuttle 
cock  of  mirth  and  repartee  they  would  be  sent  sail 
ing  and  spinning  in  Rhoda's  world.  All  the  same, 
she,  who  was  mid- Victorian  in  seeming  rather  than 

[  16] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

in  reality,  would  make  other  appeals,  if  Rhoda 
came.  Already  she  could  almost  count  the  steady 
heads  of  her  intentions  thrusting  up  as  if  through 
the  ground.  Even  in  Rhoda's  world  repartee  and 
mirth  might  be  displayed  rather  than  acted  upon, 
and  Rhoda  might  find  herself,  as  a  result  of  le  beau 
geste,  less  favourably  placed  for  the  creation  of  an 
other  drawing-room  than  she  imagined.  That,  of 
course,  was  the  line  to  take  with  Rhoda;  and  as  she 
reflected,  carefully  now,  on  what  she  would  say  to 
her,  —  as  she  determined  that  Rhoda  should  not 
leave  her  until  she  had  turned  her  face  firmly  home 
ward,  —  the  sound  of  wheels  came  up  the  road, 
and  outside  the  high  walls  she  heard  the  station  fly 
drawing  up  at  her  gates.  In  another  moment  she 
was  welcoming  Jane  Amoret  and  her  nurse. 

Ill 

SHE  had  not  seen  the  child  for  five  months  now, 
and  her  first  glance  at  her,  for  all  its  sweetness, 
brought  something  of  a  shock,  revealing  as  it  did 
how  deeply  she  cared  for  the  little  creature.  She 
was  not  a  child-lover,  not  undiscriminatingly  fond 
of  all  examples  of  the  undeveloped,  though  her 
kind  solicitude  might  have  given  her  that  appear 
ance.  Children  had  always  affected  her,  from  the 
cradle,  as  personalities;  and  some,  like  the  mature, 
were  lovable  and  some  the  reverse.  Jane  Amoret 
had  already  paid  her  more  than  one  visit  —  she 
had  been  more  than  willing  that  Rhoda  should  find 
her  a  convenience  in  this  respect;  and  she  had, 
from  the  first,  found  her  lovable.  But  the  five 
months  had  brought  much  more  to  the  mere  charm 
of  babyhood.  She  was  now  potent  and  arresting  in 

[17] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

her  appeal  and  dignity.  She  sat  in  her  nurse's 
arms,  her  eyes  fixed  on  her  great-aunt,  and,  as  Mrs. 
Delafield  held  out  her  hands  to  her,  she  unhesitat 
ingly,  if  unsmilingly,  answered,  leaning  forward  to 
be  taken. 

She  was  a  pale,  delicate  baby,  her  narrow  little 
face  framed  in  straightly  cut  dark  hair,  her  mourn 
ful  little  lips  only  tinted  with  a  rosy  mauve;  and, 
under  long,  fine  brows,  her  great  eyes  were  full  of 
meditativeness.  Rhoda,  though  now  so  richly  a 
brunette,  had,  as  a  baby,  been  ruddy-haired  and 
rosy-cheeked,  with  eyes  of  a  velvety,  submerging 
darkness.  Jane  Amoret's  grey  iris  rayed  out  from 
the  expanded  pupil  like  the  corolla  of  a  flower. 
There  was  no  likeness  between  the  child  and  her 
mother.  Nor  was  there  anything  of  Kiel's  sleepy 
young  countenance,  with  its  air  of  still  waters  run 
ning  shallow. 

Mrs.  Delafield,  something  of  a  student  of  hered 
ity,  saw  in  the  little  face  an  almost  uncanny  mod 
ern  replica  of  her  own  paternal  grandmother,  whose 
pensive  gaze,  under  high-dressed  powdered  hair, 
had  followed  her  down  the  drawing-room  in  the 
home  of  her  childhood.  In  Jane  Amoret  she  recov 
ered  the  sense  of  that  forgotten  romance  of  her 
youth  —  the  wonderful,  beautiful  great-grand 
mother  with  the  following  eyes.  Had  they  not, 
even  then,  been  asking  something  of  her? 

"It  is  n't  every  one  she'll  go  to,  ma'am,"  said  the 
nurse,  ar,  they  went  up  the  path  to  the  house,  Mrs. 
Delafk.cl  carrying  Jane  Amoret. 

Kurse  was  a  highly  efficient  example  of  her  type 
—  crisp,  cheerful,  a  little  glib.  Mrs.  Delafield  had 
never  warmly  liked  her,  and  felt  convinced  now, 
that  in  spite  of  her  decorous  veneer  of  reticence, 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

the  servants'  hall  would  be  enlightened  as  to  the 
whole  story  before  many  hours  were  over.  Well,  it 
could  not  be  helped. 

They  went  up  to  the  big  nursery  overlooking  the 
walled  garden  at  the  back  of  the  house,  where, 
since  the  morning's  post  and  its  announcements,  a 
great  fire  of  logs  had  been  blazing.  Nurse  made  but 
one  respectful,  passing  reference  to  Rhoda.  The 
country  air  would  do  Lady  Quentyn  good.  She 
had,  nurse  thought,  over-tired  herself  of  late. 
What  else  she  thought,  Parton  and  the  others  were 
soon  to  hear  hinted.  And  as  Rhoda's  calculated 
maternity  had  chilled  her  aunt  on  that  day  five 
months  ago,  so  she  was  chilled  now  to  think  that 
Rhoda  should  have  had  more  taste  in  the  choice  of 
her  drawing-room  than  in  that  of  her  baby's  nurse. 

While,  in  the  next  room,  the  unpleasing  woman 
was  unpacking  her  own  and  Jane  Amoret's  effects, 
Mrs.  Delafield  was  left  alone  with  the  child.  She 
had  found,  on  a  shelf,  a  box  of  well-worn  blocks, 
and  seating  herself  in  the  low,  chintz-covered 
wicker  chair  beside  the  fire,  she  placed  them,  one 
by  one,  before  Jane  Amoret,  who,  on  her  white 
wool  rug,  gave  them  a  gentle  attention.  She  had 
been  too  young  for  blocks  on  her  last  visit. 

The  old  chair,  as  Mrs.  Delafield  moved  in  it, 
leaning  down,  creaked  softly,  and  she  remembered, 
a  curious  excitement  stirring  under  all  these  recov 
eries  of  the  past,  that  it  had  been  condemned  as 
really  too  decrepit  when  Peggy  had  been  a  baby. 
Yet  the  threat  had  never  been  carried  out.  It  had 
gone  on  through  Peggy's  babyhood  and  through 
the  babyhood  of  Peggy's  children,  and,  unused  for 
all  these  years,  here  it  gave  forth  again  just  the 
plaintive  yet  comfortable  sounds  which,  even 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

more,  it  seemed,  than  another  baby's  presence, 
evoked  Peggy  and  her  own  young  maternity. 

The  chair,  the  blocks,  the  firelight  playing  on  the 
happy  walls,  with  their  framed  Caldecotts  and 
Cherry  Ripes  and  Bubbles,  all  evoked  that  past, 
filling  her  with  the  mingled  acquiescence  and  yearn 
ing  of  old  age.  And  Jane  Amoret  evoked  a  past 
far,  far  more  distant.  Peggy  had  not  been  like  the 
great-grandmother.  None  of  them  had  ever  rein 
carnated  that  vanished  loveliness.  But  here,  mys 
terious  and  appealing,  it  was  before  her;  and  it 
seemed  to  brush  across  her  very  heartstrings  every 
time  that,  from  the  blocks,  the  child  lifted  the 
meditative  grey  of  her  eyes  to  her  great-aunt's  face. 

Far  too  mysterious,  far  too  lovely,  far  too  gentle, 
this  frail  potentiality,  for  any  uses  ever  to  be  made 
of  it  by  Rhoda,  by  Niel,  or  by  nurse.  And  the 
yearning  became  a  yearning  over  Jane  Amoret. 

Yes,  there  the  edifice  rose,  block  by  block  —  her 
deft,  deliberate  fingers  placed  them  one  after  the 
other,  under  Jane  Amoret's  eyes,  absorbed  in  this 
towering  achievement.  The  miniature  Alhambra 
finished,  she  sat  and  gazed,  and  her  little  chest 
lifted  in  a  great  sigh  of  wonder  and  appeasement. 
Then,  her  baby  interest  dropping,  she  looked  round 
at  the  flames,  and,  for  a  little  time,  gazed  at  them, 
while  her  great-aunt's  hand  moved  softly  to  rest 
upon  her  head.  It  seemed  then,  as  if  in  answer  to 
the  rapt  and  tender  look  bent  above  her,  that  Jane 
Amoret's  eyes  were  again  raised  and  that  she 
stretched  up  her  arms  to  be  taken. 

"She  really  loves  me,"  said  Mrs.  Delafield,  as 
touched  and  trembling  as  a  young  lover.  She  lifted 
her,  pressing  the  little  body  against  her  breast;  and, 
as  Jane  Amoret  gave  herself  to  the  enfolding,  a 

[20] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

thought  that  was  as  sharp  and  as  sudden  as  a  pang 
flashed  through  her  great-aunt's  mind.  "I  can 
never  give  her  up." 

What  came  to  her  first,  as  she  sat  there,  Jane 
Amoret's  head  leaning  against  her,  was  the  thought 
of  Christmas  roses.  It  was  a  gift,  a  miracle.  And  to 
what  depths  of  loneliness  the  gift  had  been  given; 
with  what  depths  of  life  she  answered  it!  But  she 
was  breathless  while  she  tried  to  think,  knowing 
something  terrible  in  her  own  swift  acceptance; 
seeing  for  the  first  time  something  lawless  and  per 
ilous  in  her  own  nature.  Never  in  her  life  had  she 
betrayed  a  trust;  never  broken  a  law.  Yet  often, 
through  the  years,  she  had  paused,  contemplative 
and  questioning,  to  gaze  at  something  her  mirror 
showed  her,  an  implication  that  only  she  could  see, 
a  capacity  never  realized.  And  what  she  saw 
sometimes,  with  discomfort  and  shrinking,  in  those 
freaked  eyes,  those  firm  lips,  was  an  untamed  wild- 
ness  that  had  come  to  her  from  much  further  back 
than  a  great-grandmother;  something  predatory 
and  reckless,  perhaps  from  the  days  of  border  rob 
bers,  and  Highland  chiefs  whose  only  law  was  their 
own  will. 

She  knew  now  what  were  the  faces  waiting  to 
seize  upon  her  accusingly.  Not  Rhoda's.  She 
swept  Rhoda  and  her  forfeited  claim  aside.  Let  her 
stay  with  her  poet,  since  that  was  what  she  had 
chosen.  It  was  Niel  and  poor  Tim  who  looked  at 
her  aghast.  But  another  face  hovered  softly  and 
eflacingly  before  them;  a  pale  young  face  with  rosy- 
mauve  lips  and  following  eyes  that  said,  "They 
will  never  understand  me.  This  is  what  I  was  try 
ing  to  tell  you,  always.  I  knew  that  I  was  coming 
back.  This  is  what  I  was  asking  you  to  do." 

I    21    ] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

It  was  superstition;  it  did  not  deceive  her  for  a 
moment.  Desire  dressing  itself  in  a  supernatural 
appeal.  Absurd  and  discreditable.  But,  in  all 
truth  and  honour,  was  n't  there  something  in  it? 
Was  n't  there  a  time,  once  in  a  blue  moon,  for  law 
lessness,  when  it  came  as  a  miracle?  Whom  would 
she  harm,  really?  What  could  his  paternity  mean, 
really,  to  drowsy  young  Niel?  And  could  she  not 
salve  Tim's  wounds? 

The  only  thing  that  could  count,  —  she  came  to 
that  at  last,  feeling  the  child,  with  sleeping,  droop 
ing  head  and  little  hands  held  within  her  hand,  al 
ready  so  profoundly  her  own,  —  the  only  thing  was 
Jane  Amoret  herself.  Had  she  a  right  to  keep  her 
from  what  was,  perhaps,  her  chance  of  the  normal, 
even  if  the  defective,  life?  Was  n't  even  a  bad  and 
foolish  mother  better  than  no  mother  at  all,  and  an 
untarnished  name  supremely  desirable?  She  strug 
gled,  her  eyes  fixed  on  the  fire,  her  hand  uncon 
sciously  closing  fast  on  the  little  intertwined  hands 
within  it.  And  with  the  face  of  the  great-grand 
mother  came  again  the  thought  of  the  Christmas 
roses,  of  the  gift,  the  miracle. 

She  had  not  sought  anything.  She  had  not  even 
chosen.  It  was  rather  as  if  Jane  Amoret  had  chosen 
her.  She  need  not  make  an  effort  to  keep  the  gift. 
She  need  merely  make  no  effort  to  give  it  back. 
If  Rhoda  came  (oh,  she  could  but  pray  that  Rhoda 
would  not  come!),  she  need  not  find  the  right  words 
for  her.  She  had  only  to  remain  the  passive  specta 
tor  of  Rhoda's  enterprise  and  not  put  out  a  hand  to 
withdraw  her  from  it.  And,  thrusting,  feverishly, 
final  decisions  from  her,  her  mind  sprang  out  into 
far  projects  and  promises.  She  could,  with  a  will, 
live  for  twenty  more  years  yet  and  fill  them  full  for 

[22] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

Jane  Amoret.  Niel  must  not  lose  his  child,  evi 
dently.  She  would  arrange  with  Niel.  He  had  al 
ways  liked  her  and  turned  to  her.  Let  this  be  his 
home,  and  welcome.  But  of  course,  he  would  marry 
again.  She  could  persuade  him  not  to  take  Jane 
Amoret  from  her  to  give  to  a  step-mother.  Niel 
would  be  easy. 

And  Tim,  now,  must  come,  of  course.  Tim 
should,  with  her,  enjoy  Jane  Amoret  to  the  full. 
What  a  happy  childhood  she  could  make  it!  It 
was,  to  begin  with,  quite  the  happiest  nursery  she 
knew,  this  long-empty  nursery  of  hers.  In  a  few 
years'  time  Jane  Amoret  would  be  old  enough  to 
have  her  own  little  plot  in  the  garden  —  Peggy's 
plot;  and  a  pony  like  Peggy's  should  come  to  the 
empty  stables.  She  saw  already  the  merry,  in 
structed  girl  she  would  choose  as  Jane  Amoret's 
governess:  someone  young  enough  to  play  out  of 
lesson  hours;  some  one  who  would  teach  her  to 
know  birds  and  flowers  as  well  as  history  and  Latin. 
She  would  keep  Jane  Amoret's  hair  cut  like  this,  — 
it  was  the  only  point  in  the  child's  array  in  which 
her  taste  was  Rhoda's,  —  straight  across  the  fore 
head  and  straight  across  the  neck,  until  she  was 
fifteen,  and  she  should  wear  smocked  blue  linen  for 
morning  and  white  for  afternoon,  as  her  own  chil 
dren  had  done.  With  good  luck,  she  might  even 
see  Jane  Amoret  married. 

Actually,  she  was  thinking  about  Jane  Amo 
ret's  marriage,  actually  wondering  about  the  nice 
little  eldest  boy  at  the  manor,  —  while  her  arms 
tightened  in  instinctive  maternal  anxiety  around 
the  sleeping  baby,  —  when  Parton,  doing  her 
best  not  to  look  round-eyed,  announced  Lady 
Quentyn. 

[  23  ] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 


IV 

SHE  knew,  as  she  waited  for  Rhoda  to  come  up, 
that  something  she  had  forgotten  during  this  last 
half-hour  —  perhaps  it  was  her  conscience  — 
steeled  her  suddenly  to  the  endurance  of  a  test. 
Tim  had  worded  it,  "Let  her  see  the  child.  Let 
that  be  your  appeal.^  Would  it  not  appease  her 
conscience  to  stand  or  fall  by  that?  It  should  be 
her  appeal.  But  the  only  one. 

Jane  Amoret  had  waked,  and  now,  dazed  but 
unfretful,  suffered  herself  to  be  placed  again  on  the 
rug  among  the  blocks,  one  of  which  Mrs.  Delafield 
put  into  her  hands,  bidding  her  build  a  beautiful 
big  house,  as  great-aunt  had  done.  The  anguish  of 
her  own  suspense  was  made  manifest  to  her  in  the 
restless  gesture  with  which,  after  that,  and  while 
she  waited,  she  bent  to  put  another  log  on  the  fire. 

Rhoda's  soft,  deliberate  rustle  was  outside.  In 
another  moment  she  had  entered,  and  the  effect 
that  Mrs.  Delafield  dreaded  seemed  produced  on 
the  spot;  for,  arrested  at  the  very  threshold,  al 
most  before  her  eyes  had  sought  her  aunt's,  Rhoda 
stared  down  at  the  child  with  knotted,  with  even 
incredulous  brows. 

"  Oh !  He 's  sent  her  already,  then ! "  she  exclaimed. 

What  did  the  stare,  the  exclamation,  portend? 

"Yes.  He  sent  her,  of  course,  as  soon  as  he  came 
back." 

"But  why?  —  until  our  interview  is  over?" 

"Why  not?  She'd  been  alone  for  a  week."  Mrs. 
Delafield  spoke  with  the  mildness  which,  she  de 
termined,  should  not  leave  her.  "Niel,  of  course, 
wanted  to  have  her  cared  for." 

[24] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

Rhoda,  during  this  little  interchange,  had  re 
mained  near  the  door;  but  now,  perceiving,  per 
haps,  that  she  had  come  near  to  giving  herself 
away,  she  cleared  her  brows  of  their  perplexity  and 
moved  forward  to  the  fire,  where,  leaning  her  vel 
vet  elbow  on  the  mantelpiece,  she  answered,  drily 
laughing;  "Oh!  Kiel's  care!  He  wouldn't  know 
whether  the  child  were  fed  on  suet-pudding  or  cold 
ham!  She's  not  alone,  with  nurse.  There's  no  one 
who  can  take  such  care  of  her  as  nurse.  I  knew 
that."  And  she  went  on  immediately,  putting  the 
question  of  Jane  Amoret's  presence  behind  her  with 
decision,  "Well,  poor  Aunt  Isabel,  what  have  you 
to  say  to  me?  Father  wrote  that  you  would  con 
sent  to  be  the  go-between.  He  absolutely  implored 
me  to  come,  and  it's  to  satisfy  him  I'm  here,  for  I 
really  can't  imagine  what  good  it  can  do." 

No;  Mrs.  Delafield  had  grasped  her  own  security 
and  her  own  danger.  It  had  not  been  in  remorse  or 
tenderness  that  Rhoda's  eyes  had  fixed  themselves 
upon  her  child,  it  had  been  in  anxiety,  lest  Jane 
Amoret's  presence  should  be  the  signal  of  some 
final  verdict  against  her.  She  had  come  because 
she  hoped  to  be  taken  back;  and  if  there  was  all  the 
needed  justification  in  Rhoda's  callousness,  there 
was  an  undreamed-of  danger  in  her  expectation. 

"Well,  we  must  see,"  Mrs.  Delafield  remarked; 
and  already  she  was  measuring  the  necessities  of 
Rhoda's  pride  against  the  urgencies  of  Rhoda's 
disenchantment.  It  was  Rhoda's  pride  that  she 
must  hold  to.  Rhoda,  even  if  she  had  come,  had 
only  come  to  make  her  own  terms. 

"Did  you  motor  over?"  she  asked.  "You  are 
not  very  far  from  here,  are  you?" 

No  train  could  have  brought  her  at  that  hour. 

[25] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

"Twenty  miles  or  so  away,"  said  Rhoda.  "I 
was  able  to  hire  a  motor,  a  horrible,  open  affair 
with  torn  flaps  that  let  in  all  the  air,  so  that  I'm 
frozen." 

Her  loveliness  did,  indeed,  look  a  little  pinched 
and  sharpened,  and  there  was  more  than  the  cold 
drive  to  account  for  it.  But  she  was  still  surpass 
ingly  lovely,  with  the  loveliness  that,  once  you 
were  confronted  with  it,  seemed  to  explain  every 
thing  that  might  need  explanation.  That  was 
Rhoda's  strongest  card.  She  left  her  appearance  to 
speak  for  her  and  made  no  explanations,  as  now, 
when,  indeed,  she  had  all  the  air  of  expecting  other 
people  to  make  them.  But  her  aunt  only  said, 
while  Jane  Amoret,  from  her  rug,  kept  her  grave 
gaze  upon  her  mother,  "  Won't  you  have  some  hot 
milk?" 

"  Thanks,  yes,  I  should  be  glad  of  it,"  said 
Rhoda.  "How  lucky  you  are  to  have  it.  We  are 
given  only  condensed  for  our  coffee  at  the  hotel. 
It's  quite  revolting."  And  after  Mrs.  Delafield  had 
rung,  and  since  no  initiative  came  from  her,  she 
was,  in  a  manner,  forced  to  open  the  conversation. 
"Niel  has  only  himself  to  thank,"  she  said.  "He's 
been  making  himself  too  impossible  for  a  long 
time." 

"Really?  In  what  way?  Perhaps  the  hard  life 
over  there  has  affected  his  temper." 

Mrs.  Delafield  allowed  herself  the  irony. 
Rhoda,  indeed,  must  expect  that  special  flavour 
from  her. 

"Something  has  certainly  affected  it,"  said 
Rhoda,  drawing  a  chair  to  the  fire  and  spreading 
her  beautiful  hands  before  it.  "I'm  quite  tired,  I 
confess,  —  horrid  as  I'm  perfectly  aware  it  sounds 

[  26! 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

to  say  it,  —  of  hearing  about  the  hard  life.  Life 's 
hard  enough  for  all  of  us  just  now,  heaven  knows; 
and  I  think  they  have  n't  had  half  a  bad  time  over 
there,  numbers  of  them  —  men  like  Niel,  I  mean, 
who've  travelled  comfortably  about  the  world 
and  never  had  the  least  little  wound,  nor  been,  ever, 
in  any  real  danger,  as  far  as  I  can  make  out;  at 
least,  not  since  he's  had  the  staff  work.  It's  very 
different  from  my  poor  Christopher,  who  rotted  in 
the  cold  and  mud  until  it  nearly  killed  him.  There 
would  be  some  point  in  his  talking  of  a  hard  life." 

This  was  all  very  illuminating,  and  the  bold 
advance  of  Christopher  won  Mrs.  Delafield's 
admiration  for  its  manner;  but  she  passed  it  over 
to  inquire  again,  "In  what  way  has  Niel  been 
making  himself  impossible?"  The  more  impossible 
Rhoda  depicted  him,  the  easier  to  leave  her  there, 
shut  out  by  his  impossibility. 

"Why,  his  meanness,"  said  Rhoda,  her  cold, 
dark  eyes,  as  she  turned  them  upon  her  aunt,  ex 
pressing,  indeed,  quite  a  righteous  depth  of  rep 
robation.  "For  months  and  months  it's  been  the 
same  wearisome  cry.  He's  written  about  nothing 
but  economy,  fussing,  fuming,  and  preaching.  It's 
so  ugly,  at  his  time  of  life." 

"Have  you  been  a  little  extravagant,  perhaps? 
Everything  is  so  much  more  costly,  is  n't  it?  He 
may  well  have  been  anxious  about  your  future,  and 
the  child's." 

It  was  perfectly  mild,  and  the  irony  Rhoda  would 
expect  from  her. 

"Oh,  no  he  was  n't,"  said  Rhoda,  now  with  her 
gloomy  laugh.  "He  was  anxious  about  his  hunting. 
I  don't  happen  to  care  for  that  primitive  form  of 
amusement,  and  Niel  does  n't  happen  to  care  about 

[  27] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

anything  else;  certainly  he  doesn't  care  about 
beauty,  and  that's  all  I  do  care  about.  So  in  his 
view,  since,  precisely,  life  has  become  so  costly, 
beauty  had  to  go  to  the  Wall  and  I  must  n't  dress 
decently  or  have  a  decently  ordered  house.  I 
have  n't  been  in  the  least  extravagant,"  said 
Rhoda.  "I've  known  what  it  is  to  be  cold;  I've 
known  what  it  is  to  be  hungry;  it's  been,  at  times, 
literally  impossible  to  get  food  and  coal  in  London. 
Oh,  you  don't  know  anything  about  it,  Aunt 
Isabel,  tucked  away  comfortably  down  here  with 
logs  and  milk.  And  if  Niel  had  had  any  apprecia 
tion  of  the  position  and  had  realized  at  all  that  I 
prefer  being  hungry  to  being  ill-dressed,  he  would 
have  turned  his  mind  to  cutting  down  his  own 
extravagances  and  offered  to  allow  me"  —  and 
now,  for  an  instant,  if  velvet  can  show  sharpness, 
Mrs.  Delafield  caught  in  the  sliding  velvet  eye  an 
evident  edge  of  cogitation,  even  of  calculation  — 
"at  least  two  thousand  a  year  for  myself.  Money 
buys  absolutely  nothing  nowadays." 

So  there  it  was,  and  it  amounted  to  an  offer.  Or, 
rather,  it  amounted  to  saying  that  it  was  the  sum 
for  which  she  would  be  willing  to  consider  any 
offer  of  Niel's.  Mrs.  Delafield,  measuring  still 
Rhoda's  pride  against  Rhoda's  urgency,  mused  on 
her  velvet  garments,  the  fur  that  broadly  bordered 
her  skirts,  slipped  from  her  shoulders,  and  framed 
her  hands.  Poor  Tim  had  been  able  to  give  his 
daughter  only  a  few  hundred  a  year,  and  Niel's 
hunting  must  indeed  have  been  in  danger.  Rhoda's 
pride,  she  knew,  stood,  as  yet,  between  herself  and 
any  pressure  from  the  urgency;  she  could  safely 
leave  the  offer  to  lie  and  go  on  presently  to  question, 
"And  you'll  be  better  off  now?" 

r  28  1 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

Inevitably  unsuspecting  as  she  was,  Rhoda,  all 
the  same,  must  feel  an  unexpectedness  in  her  atti 
tude,  and  at  this  it  was  with  a  full,  frank  sombre- 
ness  that  she  turned  her  gaze  upon  her.  Anything 
but  a  fool  she  had  always  been,  and  she  answered, 
after  the  moment  of  gloomy  scrutiny,  "Don't 
imagine,  please.  Aunt  Isabel,  that  because  I  speak 
openly  of  practical  matters  I  left  Niel  to  get  a  bet 
ter  establishment.  I  left  him  because  I  did  n't  love 
him.  I  was  willing  to  sacrifice  anything  rather  than 
stay.  Because  it  is  a  sacrifice.  I  took  the  step  I  Ve 
taken  under  no  illusion.  We  are  too  uncivilized  yet 
for  things  to  be  anything  but  difficult  for  a  woman 
who  takes  the  step,  and  the  brave  people  have  to 
pay  for  the  cowards  and  hypocrites." 

This,  somehow,  was  not  at  all  Rhoda's  own  note. 
Mrs.  Delafield  felt  sure  she  caught  an  echo  of  Mr. 
Barley's  ministrations.  She  was  glad  that  Rhoda 
should  receive  them:  they  would  sustain  her;  and 
since  she  was  determined  —  or  almost  —  that 
Rhoda  should  stay  with  Mr.  Darley,  it  was  well 
that  she  should  receive  all  the  sustainment  pos 
sible. 

"It  certainly  must  require  great  love  and  great 
courage,"  she  assented. 

Rhoda's  eyes  still  sombrely  scrutinized  her. 
"I  did  n't  expect  you  to  see  it,  I  confess,  Aunt 
Isabel." 

"Oh,  but  I  do,"  said  Mrs.  Delafield. 

The  milk  was  now  brought  and  Rhoda  began  to 
sip  it. 

"As  for  my  being  better  off,  since  you  are  kind 
enough  to  take  an  interest  in  that  aspect  of  my 
situation,"  she  went  back,  "Christopher  hasn't, 
it's  true,  as  much  money  as  Niel.  But  our  tastes 

1*9] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

are  the  same,  so  that  I  shall  certainly  be  very  much 
better  off.  We  shall  live  in  London  —  after  Niel 
sets  me  free."  And  here  again  she  just  glanced  at 
her  aunt,  who  bowed  assent,  murmuring,  "Yes; 
yes;  he  is  quite  willing  to  set  you  free;  at  once."  — 
"And  until  then,"  Rhoda  went  on,  as  if  she  had  n't 
needed  the  assurance,  —  second-rate  assurance  as, 
Mrs.  Delafield  felt  sure,  she  found  it,  —  "and  until 
then  I  shall  stay  in  the  country.  Christopher  has 
his  post  still  at  the  Censor's  office,  and  won't,  I'm 
afraid,  get  his  demobilization  for  some  time.  He 
translates  things,  you  know.  So  we  are  going  to 
find  a  little  old  house,  for  me,  —  we  are  looking  for 
one  now,  —  and  I  shall  see  a  few  friends  there, 
quite  quietly,  and  Christopher  can  come  up  and 
down,  until  everything  is  settled.  I  think  that's  the 
best  plan." 

Rhoda  spoke  with  a  dignity  that  had  even  a 
savour  of  conscious  sweetness,  and,  as  Mrs.  Dela 
field  reflected,  was  running  herself  very  completely 
into  her  corner. 

There  was  silence  now  for  a  little  while.  Rhoda 
finished  her  milk,  and  Jane  Amoret,  gently  and 
unobtrusively  moving  among  her  blocks,  suc 
ceeded,  at  length,  in  balancing  the  last  one  on  her 
edifice  and  looked  up  at  her  great-aunt  for  appro 
bation. 

"Very  good,  darling.  A  beautiful  house,"  said 
Mrs.  Delafield,  leaning  over  her,  but  with  a  guarded 
tenderness.  What  a  serpent  she  had  become! 
There  was  Rhoda's  jealousy  to  look  out  for.  She 
might  imagine  herself  fond  of  Jane  Amoret,  if  she 
saw  that  some  one  else  adored  her. 

"She's  quite  used  to  you  already,  isn't  she?" 
said  Rhoda,  watching  them.  "  I  wonder  what  you  '11 

[30] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

make  of  her.  She  strikes  me  as  rather  a  dull  little 
thing,  though  she's  certainly  very  pretty.  She's 
rather  like  Niel,  is  n't  she?  Though  she  certainly 
is  n't  as  dull  as  Niel!"  She  laughed  slightly.  "All 
the  same,"  -  and  Mrs.  Delafield  now,  in  Rhoda's 
voice,  scented  the  close  approach  of  danger,  and 
was  aware,  though  she  did  not  look  up  to  meet  it, 
that  Rhoda's  eyes  took  on  a  new  watchfulness,  - 
"All  the  same  I  must  consider  the  poor  little  thing's 
future.  That  is,  of  course,  my  one  real  difficulty." 

"Was  it?  In  going  away?  In  having  left  her, 
you  mean?"  Mrs  Delafield  prayed  that  her  mild 
ness  might  gloss,  to  Rhoda's  ear,  the  transition  to 
conscious  combat  that  her  instinctive  change  of 
tense  revealed  to  her  own.  "Oh,  but  you  need  not 
do  that.  Don't  let  that  trouble  you  for  a  moment, 
Rhoda.  I  will  take  charge  of  her  —  complete 
charge.  I  can  do  it  easily.  My  house  is  empty,  and 
the  child  will  be  a  companion  to  me.  I  don't  find 
her  dull.  She  is  a  dear  little  thing,  so  good  and 
gentle.  You  need  really  have  no  anxiety." 

"Oh,  I  see."  Rhoda  was  gazing  at  her  earnestly. 
"Thanks.  That's  certainly  a  relief.  Though  all  the 
same  I  don't  suppose  you'd  claim  that  you  could 
replace  the  child's  mother." 

"Yes.  I  think  so,  Rhoda.  A  mother  who  had 
left  her  for  a  lover." 

Mrs.  Delafield  kept  her  eyes  fixed  on  the  fire. 
Rhoda  stood  up  and  leaned  her  back  against  the 
mantelpiece.  She  could  no  longer  control  the  mani 
festations  of  her  impatience  and  her  perplexity. 

"That  would  be  your  view,  of  course;  and 
father's;  and  Niel's.  It's  not  mine.  I  consider  the 
responsibility  to  be  Niel's." 

"Well,  whosesoever  the  responsibility,  the  deed 

[31 1 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

is  done,  is  n't  it?"  Mrs.  Delafield  observed.  "I'm 
not  arraigning  you,  you  know.  I  'm  merely  stating 
the  fact.  You  have  left  her." 

Rhoda's  impatience  now  visibly  brushed  past 
these  definitions.  "  You  say  that  Niel  is  ready  to  set 
me  free.  I  took  that  for  granted,  of  course.  It's 
only  common  decency.  But  that's  hardly  what 
father  could  have  meant  in  imploring  me  to  come 
to  —  you.  He  told  me  nothing  —  only  implored, 
and  lamented.  And,  since  I  am  here,  I'd  like  some 
information,  I  confess." 

It  was  the  first  step  away  from  pride,  and  it  was 
a  long  one.  And  Mrs.  Delafield  knew  that  with  it 
came  her  own  final  turning-point.  Here,  at  this 
moment,  she  must  be  true  to  Tim  and  Niel,  or 
betray  their  trust.  And  here  no  less  —  for  so  it 
seemed  to  her  —  she  might,  in  betraying  them, 
take  the  law  into  her  own  hands  and  promise  her 
self,  and  them,  that,  in  breaking  it,  she  would  make 
something  better.  Yet  she  did  not  feel  these  alter 
natives,  now,  at  war  within  her  mind.  She  knew 
that  they  were  there,  implicit,  but  she  knew  them 
already  answered.  Rhoda  had  answered  for  her; 
and  Jane  Amoret  had  answered.  It  took  her,  how 
ever,  a  moment  to  find  her  own  answer,  the  verbal 
one,  and  while  she  looked  for  it,  she  kept  her  eyes  on 
the  fire.  -•; 

"Your  father  wants  you  to  go  back,"  she  said  at 
last.  "Niel  is  willing  to  take  you  back.  That  is  the 
information  I  had  for  you.  Not  for  a  moment  be 
cause  he  would  accept  your  interpretation  of 
responsibility,  and  not  for  a  moment  because  of 
any  personal  feeling  for  you;  which  must  be  a  relief 
to  you.  Merely  for  your  sake,  and  the  child's. 
But  I  don't  know  how  to  plead  such  a  cause  with 

[32) 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

you,  Rhoda.  I  understand  you,  I  think,  better 
than  your  father  does.  I  Ve  always  seen  your  point 
of  view  as  he  could  never  see  it,  and  I  see  it  even 
now.  So  that  I  should  feel  that  I  asked  you  some 
thing  outrageous  in  asking  you  to  go  back  to  your 
husband  when  you  love  another  man.  If  you 
should  want  to  go  back,  that  would  be  a  very  differ 
ent  matter  —  if,  by  chance,  you  feel  you've  made 
a  mistake  and  are  tired,  already,  of  Mr.  Darley." 

She  had  time,  in  the  pause  that  followed,  the 
scales  pulsing  almost  evenly  —  it  was  as  if  she  saw 
them  —  between  Rhoda's  pride  and  Rhoda's  ur 
gency,  to  wonder  at  herself.  And  most  of  all  to 
wonder  that  she  regretted  nothing.  She  kept  her 
eyes  on  the  fire,  but  she  knew  that  Rhoda,  very 
still,  scrutinized  her  intently.  The  sharply  drawn 
tension  of  the  moment  had  resolved  itself,  to  her 
imagination,  into  a  series  of  tiny  ticks,  as  if  of  the 
scales  settling  down  to  the  choice,  before  Rhoda 
spoke.  Then  what  she  found  to  say  was,  "That's 
hardly  likely,  is  it?" 

"I  felt  it  impossible,  you  will  be  glad  to  hear," 
said  Mrs.  Delafield.  "No  one  who  understands  you 
could  suspect  you,  whatever  your  faults,  of  two 
infidelities  in  the  space  of  a  fortnight." 

And  now  again  there  was  a  long  silence,  broken 
only  by  the  lapping  of  the  flames  up  the  chimney 
and  the  soft  movements  of  Jane  Amoret  among  her 
blocks. 

Rhoda  turned  away  at  last,  facing  the  fire  and 
looking  down  at  it,  her  hands  on  the  edge  of  the 
mantelpiece,  her  foot  on  the  fender;  and  she  pres 
ently  lifted  the  foot  and  dealt  the  logs  a  kick. 

It  was  all  clear  to  Mrs.  Delafield.  She  was  tired 
of  her  poet,  or,  at  all  events,  did  not,  in  the  new  life, 

[33] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

find  compensations  enough.  She  had  come,  hoping 
to  have  her  way  made  clear  for  a  reentry,  dignified, 
if  not  triumphant,  into  the  old  life.  And  here  she 
was,  in  her  corner,  her  head  fairly  fixed  to  the  wall. 

Meanwhile,  what  had  become  of  the  mid-Vic 
torian  conscience?  What  had,  indeed,  become  of 
any  conscience  at  all,  since  she  continued  to  regret 
nothing?  She  even  found  excuses,  perfidious,  no 
doubt,  yet  satisfactory.  It  had  been  the  truth  she 
had  given  Rhoda  —  the  real  truth,  her  own,  if  not 
the  truth  she  owed  her,  not  the  truth  as  Tim  and 
Niel  had  placed  it,  all  confidently,  in  her  hands. 
But  since  it  was  preeminently  not  the  truth  that 
Rhoda  had  come  to  seize,  she  was  willing,  now  that 
she  had  fixed  her  so  firmly,  to  give  her  something 
else,  and  she  really  rejoiced  to  find  it  ready,  going 
on  presently  and  with  a  note  of  relief  that  Rhoda's 
ear  could  not  fail  to  catch :  — 

"Not  only  from  the  point  of  view  of  dignity  one 
could  n't  suspect  it  of  you,  Rhoda,  but  —  I  want  to 
say  it  to  you,  having  had  my  glimpse  of  Mr.  Dar- 
ley  —  from  the  point  of  view  of  taste.  If  you  were 
going  to  do  anything  of  this  sort,  —  and  I  don't  need 
to  tell  you  how  deeply  I  deplore  it  nor  how  wrong 
I  think  you,  —  but  if  you  were  going  to  do  it,  you 
could  n't  have  chosen  better.  He  is  gifted;  he  is 
charming;  he  is  good.  I  saw  it  all  at  once." 

There  was  her  further  truth,  and  really  it  was 
due  to  Rhoda.  Rhoda,  at  this,  faced  her  again  and, 
highly  civilized  creature  that  she  was,  it  was  with 
her  genuine  grim  mirth. 

"Upon  my  word,  Aunt  Isabel!"  she  commented. 
"You  are  astonishing." 

"Ami?  Why?"  asked  Mrs.  Delafield,  though 
she  knew  quite  well. 

[34] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

"Why,  my  dear?  Because  you  are  over  sixty 
years  old  and  you  wear  caps.  I  expected  to  find  dis 
may,  reproach,  and  lamentations  —  all  the  strains 
of  poor  old  father's  harmonium;  to  have  you  down 
on  your  knees  begging  me  to  return  to  the  paths  of 
virtue.  And  here  you  are,  cool  and  unperturbed 
and,  positively,  patting  us  on  the  back;  positively 
giving  us  your  blessing.  Well,  well,  wonders  will 
never  cease!  Yes,  he  is  charming,  no  one  can  deny 
that;  and  good  and  gifted,  too.  But  to  think  of 
your  having  spotted  it  so  quickly!  Why,  you  only 
saw  him  once,  if  I  remember,  and  I  don't  remember 
that  you  talked  at  all." 

"We  did  n't.    I  only  saw  him  once." 

"And  it  was  enough!  To  make  you  understand! 
To  make  you  condone!  —  Come,  out  with  it,  Aunt 
Isabel,  you  wicked  old  lady!  I  see  now  why  I've 
always  got  on  so  well  with  you.  You  are  wicked." 

"To  make  me  understand.  I  won't  say  con 
done." 

"You  need  n't  say  it.  You've  said  enough.  And 
vcertainly  it  is  a  feather  in  Christopher's  cap.  But 
he  is  the  sort  of  person  one  falls  in  love  with  at  first 
sight." 

"So  I  see." 

"And  so  do  I,"  said  Rhoda,  still  laughing.  But 
her  slightly  avenging  gaiety  dropped  from  her 
after  the  last  sally,  and  turning  again  to  the  fire, 
and  again  kicking  her  log,  she  said,  almost  sombrely, 
"He  absolutely  worships  me." 

Was  not  this  everybody's  justification?  Mrs. 
Delafield  seized  it,  rising,  as  on  a  satisfying  close. 

"Will  you  stay  to  lunch?"  she  asked. 

"Dear  me,  no!"  Rhoda  laughed.  "I  must  get 
back  to  Christopher.  And  the  motor  is  there  wait- 

[35 1 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

ing.  So  you'll  write  to  father  and  tell  him  that  I 
came  here  and  that  you  advised  me  to  stick  to 
Christopher." 

"Advised?  Have  I  seemed  to  advise,  Rhoda? 
Do  you  mean"  —  it  was,  Mrs.  Delafield  knew,  the 
final  peril  —  "that  you  had  considered  not  stick 
ing  to  him?" 

Rhoda  continued  to  laugh  a  little,  drawing  up 
her  furs. 

"  Rather  not !  It  could  n't  have  entered  my  head, 
could  it,  either  from  the  point  of  view  of  dignity 
or  of  taste  —  as  you  've  been  telling  me  ?  You  have 
been  very  wonderful,  you  know!  Tell  father,  then, 
if  you  like,  that  you  gave  us  your  blessing." 

"I'll  tell  him,"  said  Mrs.  Delafield,  "that  I'm 
convinced  you  ought  not  to  go  back  to  Niel." 

"I  see,"  —  Rhoda  nodded,  and  their  eyes 
sounded  each  other,  curiously,  —  "though  father 
thinks  I  ought." 

"Of  course.   That's  why  you're  here." 

"Father  would  have  gone  down  on  his  knees  to 
beg  me." 

"Yes.   Down  on  his  knees.   Poor  Tim!" 

She  was  horribly  frightened,  but  she  faced 
Rhoda's  grim  mirth  deliberate  with  gravity.  And 
Rhoda,  whatever  she  might  have  seen  or  guessed, 
accepted  her  defeat;  accepted  the  dignity  and  taste 
thrust  upon  her. 

"Father,  in  other  words,  is  n't  a  wicked  old  gen 
tleman  as  you  are  a  wicked  old  lady.  I  see  it  all, 
and  it's  all  a  feather  in  Christopher's  cap.  Well, 
Aunt  Isabel,  good-bye.  Shall  I  see  you  again? 
Will  you  come  and  call  when  I'm  Mrs.  Darley? 
I  don't  see  how,  with  a  clear  conscience,  you  can 
chuck  us,  you  know." 

[36] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

"Nor  do  I,"  Mrs.  Delafield  conceded,  after  only 
a  pause.  "I  don't  often  go  to  London,  but,  when  I 
do,  I  shall  look  in  upon  you,  if  you  want  me  to." 

"Rather!"  Rhoda,  now  gloved  and  muffled,  had 
fallen  back  on  her  normal  rich  economy  of  speech. 
"You'll  be  useful  as  well  as  pleasant.  And  Christo 
pher  will  adore  you,  I  'm  sure.  I  '11  tell  him  that  you 
think  him  charming." 

"Do,"  said  Mrs.  Delafield,  following  her  to  the 
door. 

She  had  forgotten  even  to  kiss  Jane  Amoret 
good-bye. 

V 

STILL  Mrs.  Delafield  knew  no  remorse.  Rather,  a 
wine-like  elation  filled  her.  She  thought  of  her 
state  of  consciousness  in  terms  of  wine,  and  or 
dered  up  from  her  modest  cellar  a  special  old  port, 
hardly  tasted  since  her  husband's  death,  and,  all 
alone,  drank  at  lunch  a  little  glass  in  honour  of 
Jane  Amoret's  advent.  Also,  though  elated,  she 
was  conscious  of  needing  a  stimulant.  The  scene 
with  Rhoda  had  cost  her  more  than  could,  at  the 
moment,  be  quite  computed. 

What  it  had  won  for  her  she  was  able  to  compute 
when,  after  lunch,  she  went  upstairs  to  look  at  Jane 
Amoret  asleep  in  her  white  cot.  She  did  not  feel 
like  a  robber  brooding  in  guilty  joy  over  ill-gotten 
booty.  She  could  not  feel  herself  that,  nor  Jane 
Amoret  booty.  Jane  Amoret  was  treasure,  pure 
heaven-sent  treasure,  her  flower  of  miracle.  Christ 
mas  roses  had  been  in  her  mind  since  morning,  and 
the  darkness,  the  whiteness  of  the  child,  as  well  as 
her  beautiful  unexpectedness,  made  her  think  of 
them  anew;  her  gravity,  too;  something  of  melan- 

[37] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

choly  that  the  flowers  embodied;  for  they  were  not 
smiling  flowers  —  gazing  rather  at  the  wintry  sky 
in  earnest  meditation. 

Jane  Amoret's  black  lashes  lay  upon  her  cheek, 
ever  so  slightly  turned  up  at  the  tips,  and  her  great- 
aunt,  leaning  over  her,  felt  herself  doting  upon  them 
and  upon  the  little  softly  breathing  profile  em 
bedded  in  the  pillow,  a  bud-like,  folded  hand  beside 
it. 

"Little  darling,  we  will  make  each  other  happy," 
she  whispered. 

Rhoda  had  passed  from  their  lives  like  a  storm- 
cloud. 

Jane  Amoret  was  still  sleeping,  and  she  had  gone 
downstairs  to  the  little  morning-room  where,  since 
the  war,  she  had  really  lived,  to  settle  with  herself 
what  she  must  say  to  Tim,  when  there  came  a 
ringing  at  the  front-door  bell.  The  morning-room, 
at  the  back  of  the  house,  like  the  nursery,  over 
looked  the  southern  lawn  and  the  walls  of  the 
kitchen-garden;  but  she  could  usually  hear  if  a 
motor  drove  up,  and,  in  her  still  concentration  upon 
the  empty  sheet  lying  before  her  on  the  desk,  she 
was  aware  that  there  had  been  no  sound.  It  was 
too  early  for  a  visitor,  too  early  for  the  post,  and 
she  looked  up  with  some  curiosity  as  Parton  came 
in. 

"It's  a  gentleman,  ma'am,  to  see  you,"  said  Par- 
ton;  and  her  young,  trained  visage  showed  signs  of  a 
discomfiture  deeper  than  that  Rhoda's  coming  had 
evoked.  "Mr.  Darley,  ma'am;  and  he  hopes  very 
much  you  are  disengaged." 

Mrs.  Delafield  had,  as  a  first  sensation,  that  of 
sympathy  with  Parton.  Parton  evidently  knew  all 
about  it  and  was  evidently  in  distress  lest  her  face 

[  38  ] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

betrayed  her  knowledge.  In  her  effort  to  maintain 
her  own  standards  of  impassivity  she  suddenly 
blushed  crimson,  and  Mrs.  Delafield  then  felt  that 
she  was  very  old  and  Parton  very  young,  and  that 
in  that  fact  alone  was  a  bond,  even  if  there  had 
been  no  other.  She  had  many  bonds  with  Parton, 
and  now,  seeing  her  so  soft,  uncertain,  and  dis 
mayed,  she  would  have  liked  to  pat  her  on  the 
shoulder  and  say,  "There,  my  dear,  it  does  n't  make 
any  difference.  I  assure  you  I'm  not  disturbed." 
And  since  she  could  not  say  it,  she  looked  it,  replying 
with  the  utmost  equability,  "Mr.  Darley?  By  all 
means.  Show  him  in  at  once,  Parton." 

There  was,  after  Parton  had  gone,  a  short  in 
terval,  while  Mr.  Darley  doubtless  was  taking  off 
his  coat,  and  during  which  she  felt  herself  mainly 
engaged  in  maintaining  her  equability.  But,  after 
her  encounter  with  Rhoda,  was  n't  she  equable 
enough  for  any  situation?  Besides,  Mr.  Darley 
could  in  no  fashion  menace  Jane  Amoret,  and  un 
der  all  her  conjectures  and  amazements  there  lay  a 
certain  satisfaction.  She  knew,  from  her  encounter 
with  Parton,  that  she  was  interested  in  all  young 
creatures  when  they  were  nice,  and  she  was  not 
sorry  to  have  another  look  at  Mr.  Darley. 

When  he  entered  and  she  saw  him,  —  not  in 
khaki  as  that  first  time,  but  in  a  gray  tweed  suit,  - 
when  Parton  had  softly  and  securely  closed  the 
door  and  left  them  together,  she  found  herself 
borne  along  on  a  curious  deepening  of  the  current 
of  sympathy  for  mere  youth.  She  had  not  remem 
bered  how  young  he  was;  she  had  not  had  that  as 
her  dominant  impression  at  Rhoda's  tea,  as  she  had 
it  now.  He  must  be  several  years  younger  than 
Rhoda;  hardly  more  than  twenty-two  or  three, 

[39] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

she  thought;  and  it  must  have  been  as  a  mere  child 
that  the  war  had  swept  him  out  into  maturing 
initiations.  Something  of  an  experience,  shattering 
yet  solidifying,  was  in  his  face,  fragile,  wasted,  yet 
more  final  and  finished  than  one  would  have  ex 
pected  at  his  time  of  life;  and  also,  in  curious  con 
trast  to  his  boyish,  beardless  look,  a  deep  line  was 
engraved  across  his  forehead;  whether  by  suffering 
or  by  the  trick  she  soon  discovered  in  him  of 
raising  his  eyebrows  in  an  effort  of  intense  concen 
tration,  she  could  not  tell. 

She  gave  him  her  hand  simply,  and  said,  "Do 
sit  down." 

But  Mr.  Darley,  though  he  looked  at  the  chair 
she  indicated,  did  not  take  it.  He  remained  stand 
ing  on  the  hearthrug,  facing  the  windows,  his  hands 
clasped  behind  him,  and  she  then  became  aware 
that  he  was  enduring  a  veritable  agony  of  shyness. 
It  did  not  take  the  form  of  blushes,  —  though  his 
was  a  girlish  skin  that  would  display  them  in 
stantly,  —  or  of  awkward  gestures  or  faltering 
speech.  It  was  a  shyness  wild,  still,  and  bereft 
of  all  appeal,  like  that  of  a  bird,  —  the  simile  came 
sharply  to  her,  —  a  bird  that  had  followed  some 
swift  impulse  and  that  now,  caught  in  a  sudden 
hand,  relapsed  into  utter  immobility.  His  large 
eyes  were  on  hers  —  fixed.  His  expression  was  like 
a  throbbing  heart.  She  knew  that  all  she  wanted, 
for  the  moment,  was  to  show  him  that  the  hand  was 
gentle. 

"I'm  afraid  you  came  hoping  to  find  Rhoda," 
she  said,  looking  away  from  him  and  giving  her 
chair,  as  a  pretext,  sundry  little  adjustments  be 
fore  drawing  it  to  the  fire.  "But  she  left  this 
morning,  after  seeing  me,  and  you  must  have 

[40] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

crossed  her  on  the  road.    At  least  —  have  you 
motored?" 

The  large  eyes,  she  found,  were  still  fixed  on  her 
as,  with  the  question,  she  glanced  up  at  him;  but 
he  answered  immediately  —  rather  as  if  with  a 
croaking  cry  from  the  blackbird  when  one  pressed 

it,— 

"No;  I  came  by  train.  I  left  a  little  after  Rhoda 
did." 

"  By  train  ? "  she  marvelled  kindly.  "  But  we  are 
four  miles  from  the  station  here.  Are  n't  you,  at 
your  end,  as  far?  And  such  roads!"  She  saw  now 
that  his  boots  and  upturned  trousers  were,  indeed, 
deeply  mired. 

"Oh —  I  didn't  mind  the  walk,"  said  Mr. 
Darley.  "It  was  n't  far." 

She  was  sure  he  had  n't  found  it  far.  His  whole 
demeanour  expressed  the  overmastering  impulse 
that  had,  till  then,  sustained  him. 

"Have  you  had  any  lunch?"  she  went  on.  "I 
can't  think  where  you  can  have  lunched.  There's 
nothing  at  the  station.  Do  let  me  send  for  some 
thing.  I've  only  just  finished." 

It  seemed  strangely  indicated  that  she  should, 
to-day,  feed  Rhoda  and  her  lover. 

But  the  caught  blackbird  was  in  no  state  for 
feeding.  More  wildly,  yet  more  faintly  than  before 
he  gave  forth  the  croaking  cry  with,  "Oh,  no. 
Thanks  so  much.  Yes.  At  our  station.  I  found 
something  at  our  station.  Sandwiches;  no,  a  bun. 
I  had  a  cup  of  Bovril." 

And  now,  curiously,  poignantly  to  her,  he  began 
to  blush  as  though  suddenly  and  overwhelmingly 
aware  of  himself  and  of  how  idiotically  he  must  be 
behaving.  Poor  child!  How  young  he  was!  And 

[41  ] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

how  ill  he  had  been  in  the  trenches;  and  how  beau 
tiful  it  was  to  remember  —  as  she  did  suddenly, 
and  not  irrelevantly,  she  knew,  though  she  could 
not  trace  the  relevance  —  that,  in  the  little  volume, 
written  since  his  return,  there  had  not  been  a 
shadow  of  the  ugly  rancour,  revengeful  and  pro 
vocative,  one  met  in  some  other  soldier-poets 
whom  one  might  have  fancied  to  be  of  his  kind. 
For  how  he  must  have  hated  it!  And,  at  the  same 
time,  —  memory  brought  back  a  line,  a  stanza  here 
and  there,  from  her  snatched  reading  —  how  holy 
he  had  found  it;  seeing  so  much  more  than  error, 
death,  and  suffering. 

^  Her  eyes  dwelt  on  him  with  something  beyond  the 
kindly  wish  to  spare  him  as  she  said,  "  Please  sit 
down.  You  must  be  very  tired  and  you  are  not 
strong,  Rhoda  told  me.  Don't  be  afraid  of  me.  I 
am  an  old  lady  who  can  listen  to  anything  and,  I 
think,  understand  a  great  deal.  I  Ve  already  heard 
a  great  deal  from  Rhoda.  I'm  anything  but  un 
friendly  to  you,  I  assure  you." 

It  was  —  she  was  aware  of  it  when  it  had  crossed 
her  lips  —  a  curious  thing  to  say  to  her  niece's 
lover,  to  the  man  who  had  destroyed  Tim's  happi 
ness  and  wrecked  Niel's  home;  but  it  was  too  true 
not  to  be  said.  And  she  was  perfectly  sure  now  that 
it  was  not  Mr.  Darley  who  had  wrecked  and  de 
stroyed.  It  was  Rhoda  who  had  taken  him,  of 
course;  not  he  Rhoda.  He  would  never  take  any 
body.  He  would  stand  and  gaze  at  them  as  he  now 
gazed  at  her,  and  only  when  they  threw  out  ap 
pealing  arms  would  he  move  towards  them.  Rhoda 
had  thrown  out  appealing  arms  —  after  she  dis 
covered  that  alluring  arms  had  no  effect.  Mrs. 
Delafield's  impressions  and  intuitions  tumbled 

[42] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

forth  in  positive  clusters  as  she  took  in  her  com 
panion.  Allurements,  Russian-ballet  back-grounds, 
snowy  throats  and  velvet  eyes,  would  have  no 
effect  upon  him  at  all;  he  cared  as  little  about  them 
at  one  end  of  the  scale  of  sensations  as  about  rats 
and  corpses  at  the  other.  He  would  not  even  see 
them.  It  was  something  else  he  had  seen  in  Rhoda; 
something  she  had  found  herself  driven  to  display. 
And  if  she  were  getting  tired  of  him  already,  it  was 
simply  because,  having  trapped  him  with  the  arti 
fice,  she  now  found  herself  shut  up  with  him  in  a 
cage,  which,  while  it  was  of  her  own  making,  was 
extremely  uncongenial  to  her. 

Mr.  Darley  was  far  too  absorbed  in  what  she 
had  just  said  to  him  to  think  of  taking  the  chair. 
It  had  helped  him  incalculably  —  that  was  quite 
apparent;  for  though  the  blush  stayed,  and  though 
he  was  still  wild  and  shy,  they  had  already,  indubita 
bly,  begun  to  understand  each  other. 

"Do  you  mean,"  he  asked,  "not  unfriendly  to 
me  or  not  unfriendly  to  Rhoda?" 

This  was  an  unexpected  question,  and  for  a 
moment,  not  knowing  what  it  portended,  she  hardly 
knew  how  to  meet  it.  But  the  understanding  that 
seemed  to  deepen  with  every  moment  made  truth 
the  most  essential  thing,  and  she  replied  after  only 
a  hesitation,  "To  you." 

Mr.  Darley  looked  all  his  astonishment.  "But 
why?  Do  you  feel  that  you  like  me,  too?  Because, 
of  course,  I've  never  forgotten  you.  That's  why  I 
felt  it  possible  to  come  to-day." 

And  since  truth  was  essential,  it  was  she,  now, 
who  looked,  with  her  surprise,  something  that  she 
felt  to  be  a  recognition,  as  she  replied,  "I  suppose 
it  must  be  that.  I  suppose  we  liked  each  other  at 

[43] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 


first  sight.  I  certainly  did  n't  know  the  feeling  was 


reciprocal." 


"  Nor  did  I ! "  Mr.  Darley  exclaimed.  He  took  the 
chair  at  the  other  end  of  the  hearthrug,  facing  her, 
his  knees  crossed,  his  arms  clutched  tightly  across 
his  chest;  and  now  he  was  able  to  reach  his  journey's 
goal.  As  all,  on  Rhoda's  side,  had  been  made  clear 
to  her  that  morning,  so  on  his,  all  was  clear,  as  he 
said,  with  a  solemnity  so  young,  so  genuine  that 
it  almost  brought  tears  to  her  eyes,  "Then  since 
you  do  like  me,  please  don't  let  her  leave  me!" 

The  situation  was  before  her,  definite  and  over 
powering;  but  how  it  could  have  come  about 
remained  veiled  like  the  misty  approaches  to  a 
mountain. 

"Does  Rhoda  want  to  leave  you?"  she  ques 
tioned. 

"Why  —  did  n't  you  know?"  Mr.  Barley's  face 
flashed  with  a  sort  of  stupor.  "Did  n't  she  come 
for  that?" 

"You  answer  my  questions  first,"  Mrs.  Dela- 
field  said  after  a  moment. 

He  was  obedient  and  full  of  trust.  "It's  because 
of  the  child,  you  know,  that  lovely  little  creature 
in  London.  From  the  first  —  you  can't  think  how 
long  ago  it  already  seems,  though  we  have  hardly 
been  a  week  together  —  I  Ve  seen  it  growing,  that 
feeling  in  her  that  she  could  n't  bear  it.  Other 
things,  too;  but  that  more  than  all.  At  least,"  he 
was  truthful  to  the  last  point  of  scruple,  "  I  think 
so.  And  though  she  did  not  tell  me  that  she  was 
saying  good-bye  this  morning,  I  knew  —  I  knew  — 
that  she  was  coming  to  you  because  she  wanted  her 
child,  and  would  accept  anything,  endure  anything, 
to  be  with  it  again." 

[44] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

"What  do  you  think  Rhoda  had  to  endure?" 
Mrs.  Delafield  inquired. 

"Oh  —  you  can't  ask  me  that!  I  saw  you  in  it 
and  you  saw  me!"  Mr.  Darley  exclaimed.  "You 
will  be  straight  with  me?  You  saw  that  soulless 
life  of  hers,  with  that  selfish  figurehead  of  a  hus 
band  for  all  guide.  She  was  suffocating  in  it.  She 
did  n't  need  to  tell  me.  I  saw  it  in  her  face  before 
she  told  me.  How  can  a  woman  live  with  a  man 
she  does  n't  love?  When  you  said  not  unfriendly 
to  me,  did  you  mean  to  make  a  difference?  Did 
you  mean  that  you  don't  care  for  Rhoda?  Yet 
she's  always  loved  and  trusted  you,  she  told  me, 
more  than  any  one.  You  were  the  one  reality  she 
clung  to.  That's  why  she  could  come  to  you  to 
day." 

"What  I  mean  is  that  I'm  on  your  side,  not  on 
Rhoda's,"  said  Mrs.  Delafield,  and  at  the  moment 
her  charming  old  white  face  expressed,  perhaps 
as  never  before  in  her  life,  the  quality  of  decisive 
ness.  "I  am  on  your  side.  But  I  have  to  see  what 
that  is." 

He  was  feeling  her  face  even  more  than  her 
words.  He  was  gazing  at  her  with  a  rapt  scrutiny 
which,  she  reflected,  exonerating  Rhoda  to  that 
extent,  would  make  it  difficult  for  a  woman  re 
ceiving  such  a  tribute  not  to  wish  to  retain  it  per 
manently.  It  enriched  and  sustained  one  and  — 
although  it  was  strange  that  she  should  feel  this  — 
troubled  and  moved  one,  too.  A  sense  of  pain 
stirred  in  her,  and  of  wonder  about  herself  and  her 
fitness  to  receive  such  gazes.  One  really  could  n't, 
at  sixty-three,  have  growing  pains;  yet  Mr.  Dar- 
ley's  gaze  filled  her  with  that  troubled  conscious 
ness  of  expanding  life.  He  wanted  Rhoda.  She 

[45  ] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

wanted  Jane  Amoret.  So,  was  n't  it  all  right? 
Was  n't  she  all  right?  His  side  was  her  side.  They 
wanted  the  same  thing.  But  the  troubled  sap  of 
the  new  consciousness  was  rising  in  her. 

"My  side  is  really  Rhoda's  side,"  said  Mr.  Dar- 
ley,  as  if  answering  her  thought.  He  held  his  knee 
in  gripped  hands  and  spoke  with  rapid  security. 
He  was  still  shy,  but  he  now  knew  exactly  what  he 
wished  to  say,  and  how  to  say  it.  "It's  Rhoda's 
side,  if  only  she'd  see  it.  That's  why  I  was  not 
disloyal  in  asking  my  question  when  you  said  you 
were  n't  unfriendly.  Really  —  really  —  you  will 
believe  me  —  it's  for  her,  too.  I  would  n't  have 
let  her  come  with  me  if  it  had  n't  been.  I  'm  not  so 
selfish  as  I  seem.  I  know  it's  dreadful  about  the 
child.  But  —  this  is  my  secret;  Rhoda  does  not 
guess  it  and  I  could  never  tell  her  —  she  does  n't 
love  the  child  as  she  thinks  she  does.  Not  really. 
In  spite  of  her  longing.  She  longs  to  love  it,  of 
course;  but  she  is  n't  a  mother;  not  to  that  child. 
That's  another  reason.  It  was  all  false.  The  whole 
thing.  The  whole  of  her  life.  The  real  truth  is," 
said  Christopher  Darley,  gazing  large-eyed  at  her, 
"that  Rhoda  is  frightened  and  wants  to  go  back. 
She's  not  as  brave  as  she  thought  she  was.  Not 
quite  as  brave  as  I  thought.  But  if  she  yields  to  her 
fear  and  leaves  me,  —  she  has  n't  yet,  I  know,  I 
see  that  in  your  face,  —  but  if  she  goes  back  to  her 
old  life,  it  will  mean  dust,  humiliation,  imprison 
ment  forever." 

"That's  what  I  told  her,"  Mrs.  Delafield  said, 
her  eyes  on  his. 

"I  knew!  I  knew!"  cried  the  young  man.  "I 
knew  you  'd  done  something  beautiful  for  me  — 
for  us.  Because  you  see  the  truth.  And  you  were 

[46] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

able  to  succeed  where  I  failed!  You  were  able  to 
convince  her!  You've  saved  us  both!  Oh,  how  I 
thank  you!" 

"It  was  n't  quite  like  that,"  said  Mrs.  Delafield. 
"It  was  n't  to  save  either  of  you.  I  don't  think  it 
right  for  a  woman  to  leave  her  husband  with 
another  man  because  she  has  ceased  to  love  her 
husband.  But  I  made  her  go  back.  I  would  n't 
even  let  her  tell  me  that  she  wanted  to  leave  you. 
I  did  n't  convince  her.  I  merely  made  it  impossible 
for  her.  She  left  me  reluctant  and  bewildered. 
You  have  n't  found  out  yet,"  -  Mrs.  Delafield 
leaned  forward  and  picked  up  the  little  poker;  the 
fire  needed  no  poking  and  the  movement  expressed 
only  her  inner  restlessness,  -  "you  have  n't  found 
out  that  Rhoda,  at  all  events,  is  very  selfish?" 

Christopher  Darley  at  that  stopped  short.  "Oh, 
yes,  I  have,"  he  answered  then;  but  the  frightened 
croak  was  in  his  voice  as  he  said  it. 

"And  have  you  found  out,  too,"  said  Mrs. 
Delafield,  eyeing  her  poker,  sparing  him,  giving 
him  time,  "that  she's  unscrupulous  and  cold- 
hearted  ?  Do  you  see  the  sort  of  life  she'll  make  for 
you,  if  she  is  faithful  to  you  and  stays  with  you, 
not  because  she's  faithful,  not  because  she  wants  to 
stay,  but  gagged  and  baulked  by  me?  Haven't 
you  already --yourself,  been  a  little  frightened 
sometimes?"  she  finished. 

She  kept  her  eyes  on  her  poker  and  gave  Mr. 
Darley  his  time,  and  indeed  he  needed  it. 

"If  you've  been  so  wonderful,"  he  said  at  last, 
with  the  slow  care  of  one  who  threads  his  way 
among  swords;  "if,  though  you  think  we're  law 
breakers,  you  think,  too,  that  we  've  made  ourselves 
another  law  and  are  bound  to  stand  by  it;  if  you  've 

[47] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

sent  her  back  to  me  —  why  do  you  ask  me  that? 
But  no,"  he  went  on,  "I'm  not  frightened.  You 
see  —  I  love  her." 

"She  does  n't  love  you,"  said  Mrs.  Delafield. 

"She  will!  She  will!"  —  It  made  Mrs.  Delafield 
think  of  the  shaking  heart-throbs  of  the  blackbird. 
—  "All  that  you  see,  —  yes,  yes,  I  won't  pretend 
to  you,  because  I  trust  you  as  I've  never  before 
trusted  any  human  being,  because  you  are  truer 
than  anyone  I've  ever  met,  —  it's  all  true.  She  is 
all  that.  But  don't  you  see  further?  Don't  you  see 
it's  the  life?  She's  never  known  anything  else. 
She's  never  had  a  chance." 

"She's  known  me.    She's  had  me." 

Mrs.  Delafield's  eyes  did  not  leave  the  poker. 
But  under  the  quiet  statement  the  struggle  in  her 
reached  its  bitter  close.  She  had  lost  Jane  Amoret. 
She  must  give  her  up.  Not  for  her  sake;  nor  for 
Rhoda's,  —  oh,  in  no  sense  for  Rhoda's,  —  but  for 
his.  She  could  not  let  him  pay  the  price.  She  must 
save  him  from  Rhoda. 

"  What  do  you  mean  ? "  he  asked ;  and  it  was  as  if 
crumbling  before  her  secure  strength,  almost  with 
tears. 

"I  mean  that  you'll  never  make  anything 
different  of  her.  I  never  have,  and  I've  known  her 
since  she  was  born.  You  won't  make  her,  and  she'll 
unmake  you.  She  is  disintegrating.  She  has  always 
been  like  that.  Nothing  has  spoiled  her.  From  the 
first  she's  been  selfish  and  untender.  I  don't  mean 
to  say  that  she  has  n't  good  points.  She  has  a  sense 
of  humour;  and  she's  honest  with  herself:  she  knows 
what  she  wants  and  why  she  wants  it  —  although 
she  may  take  care  that  you  don't.  She  is  n't  petty 
or  spiteful  or  revengeful.  No,"  —  Mrs.  Delafield 

[48] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

moved  her  poker  slowly  up  and  down  as  she  carved 
it  out  for  him,  and  it  seemed  to  be  into  her  own 
heart  she  was  cutting,  —  "  there  is  a  largeness  and 
a  dignity  about  Rhoda.  But  she  feels  no  beauty 
and  no  tragedy  in  life,  only  irony  and  opportunity. 
You'll  no  more  change  her  than  you'll  change  a 
flower,  a  fish,  or  a  stone." 

Holding  his  knee  in  the  strained  grasp,  Christo 
pher  Darley  kept  his  eyes  on  her,  breathing 
quickly. 

"Why  did  she  come  with  me,  then?"  he  asked, 
after  the  silence  between  them  had  grown  long. 
(Strange,  she  thought,  so  near  they  were,  that  he 
could  not  know  her  heart  was  breaking,  too.  All 
the  time  it  was  Jane  Amoret's  sleeping  eyelashes 
she  saw.)  "Why  did  she  love  me?  I  am  not  irony 
or  opportunity." 

"Do  you  think  she  ever  loved  you?"  said  Mrs. 
Delafield.  "Was  it  not  only  that  she  wanted  you 
to  love  her?  Was  n't  it  because  you  were  different, 
and  difficult,  and  new?  I  think  so.  I  think  you 
found  her  at  a  bored,  antagonistic  moment; 
money-quarrels  with  her  husband,  —  he  is  a  good 
young  fellow,  Niel,  and  he  used  to  worship  her,  — 
the  war  over  and  life  to  take  up  again  on  terms 
already  stale.  She  is  calculating;  but  she  is  ad 
venturous  and  reckless,  too.  So  she  went.  And  of 
course  she  was  in  love  with  you  then.  That  goes 
without  saying,  and  you  '11  know  what  I  mean  by  it. 
But  Rhoda  gets  through  things  quickly.  She  has  no 
soil  in  her  in  which  roots  can  grow;  perhaps  that's 
what  I  mean  by  saying  she  can't  change.  One  can't, 
if  one  can't  grow  roots.  But  now  you  are  no  longer 
new  or  difficult.  You  are  easy  and  old  —  already 
old;  and  she's  tired  of  you.  You  bore  her.  You 

[49] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

constrain  and  baffle  her  —  if  she's  to  keep  up 
appearances  with  you  at  all;  and  she'd  like  to  do 
that,  because  she  admires  you  exceedingly.  So 
she  wants  to  go  back  to  Niel.  I  know,"  said  Mrs. 
Delafield,  slightly  shaking  her  poker,  "that  if  I'd 
given  her  a  loophole  this  morning,  she'd  be  on  her 
way  to  London  now." 

"And  why  didn't  you?"  asked  Christopher 
Darley. 

Ah,  why?  Again  she  brooded  over  the  softly 
breathing  little  profile,  again  met  the  upward  gaze 
of  Jane  Amoret's  grey  eyes.  Well  might  he  ask 
why.  But  there  was  the  one  truth  she  could  not 
give  him.  There  was  another  that  she  could,  and 
she  had  it  ready.  "I  had  n't  seen  you,"  she  said. 

"You  thought  it  right  for  her  to  come  back  to 
me,  until  you  saw  me?" 

"I  thought  it  beneath  her  dignity  —  as  I  said  to 
her  —  to  be  unfaithful  to  two  men  within  a  fort 
night." 

"But  why  should  you  care  for  her  dignity?" 
Mr.  Darley  strangely  pressed.  "Why  should  n't 
you  care  more  for  your  brother's  dignity,  and  her 
husband's,  and  her  child's  —  all  the  things  she 
said  you'd  care  for?" 

He  had  brought  her  eyes  to  his  now,  and,  for  the 
first  time  since  they  met,  it  was  he  who  had  the 
advantage.  Frowning,  yet  clear,  he  bent  his  great 
young  eyes  upon  her  and  she  knew,  dismayingly, 
that  her  thoughts  were  scattered. 

"  I  have  always  cared  for  Rhoda."  She  seized  the 
first  one. 

"Is  it  a  future  for  Rhoda  to  disintegrate  the  life 
of  the  man  who  loves  her  and  to  get  no  good  of  him  ? 
Is  n't  it  better  for  a  woman  like  Rhoda  to  go  back 

[50] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

to  the  apparent  dignity,  since  she  has  no  feeling  for 
the  real?  Is  n't  that  what  you  would  have  felt,  if 
you'd  been  feeling  for  Rhoda?  It  was  n't  because 
you  felt  for  her,"  said  Christopher  Darley.  "You 
had  some  other  reason.  You  are  keeping  another 
reason  from  me.  You  know,"  he  urged  upon  her 
with  a  strange,  still  austerity,  "you  know  you  can't 
do  that.  You  know  we  must  say  the  truth  to  each 
other.  You  know  that  we  simply  belong  to  each 
other,  you  and  I." 

"My  dear  Mr.  Darley  —  my  dear  young  man!" 
She  was,  indeed,  bereft  of  all  resource.    She  laid 
down  her  poker  and,  as  she  did  so,  felt  herself 
disarming  before  him.    His  eyes,  following  her  re 
treat,  challenged  her,  almost  with  fierceness. 

"I  know  —  I  know  that  you  are  giving  up  some 
thing  because  of  me,"  he  said.  "You  want  her  to 
go  back  to  her  husband  now,  so  that  I  may  be  free. 
It  was  n't  of  me  you  thought  this  morning;  nor  of 
your  brother,  nor  of  Rhoda.  Everything  changed 
for  you  after  you  saw  me.  What  is  it?  What  is  it 
that  made  you  send  Rhoda  back  to  me  and  that 
makes  you  now  want  to  free  me?  You  are  beautiful 

—  but   you   are    terrible.    You   do   beautiful  and 
terrible  things.  And  you  must  let  me  share.  You 
must  let  me  decide,  too,  if  you  do  them  for  me!" 

He  had  started  up,  but  not  to  come  nearer  in  his 
appeal  and  his  demand.  Cut  to  the  heart  as  he  was, 

—  for  she  knew  how  she  had  pierced,  —  it  was 
rather  the  probing  of  some  more  intolerable  pain 
that  moved  him.  And  looking  down  at  her  with  eyes 
intolerant  of  her  mercy,  he  embodied  to  her  her 
sense  of  a  new  life  and  a  new  conscience.  Absurd 
though   his  words   might    seem,  they  were   true. 
Though   never,  perhaps,  again  to  meet,  she  and 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

Christopher  Darley  recognized  in  each  other  some 
final  affinity  and  owed  each  other  final  truth. 

She  no  longer  felt  old  and  wise,  but  young  and 
helpless  before  the  compulsion  of  the  kindred  soul. 
She  owed  him  the  truth,  and  in  giving  it  she  must 
risk  his  freedom  and  his  happiness.  Looking  up  at 
him,  that  sense  of  compulsion  upon  her,  she  said, 
"It  was  because  of  Jane  Amoret.  It  was  because  I 
loved  her  and  wanted  to  keep  her." 

Christopher  Darley  grew  paler  than  before. 
"She  is  here?" 

"Yes.  She  came  this  morning.  She  is  upstairs, 
sleeping." 

"Rhoda  saw  her?" 

"Yes." 

"And  left  her?  To  you?" 

"Yes.   Left  her  to  me." 

He  raised  his  head  with  a  backward  jerk  and 
stared  out  of  the  window  before  him.  She  kept  her 
eyes  on  his  face,  measuring  its  strength  against  hers. 
He  was  not  measuring.  He  seemed  to  be  seeing  the 
beautiful  and  terrible  things  of  which,  he  had  told 
her,  she  was  capable.  She  felt,  when  his  eyes  came 
back  to  her,  that  he  had  judged  her. 

"You  see  you  can't,"  he  said  gently. 

"Can't  what?    Can't  keep  her,  you  mean,  of 


course." 


"Anything  but  that.  You  can't  abandon  her  — 
even  for  my  sake." 

So  that  had  been  the  judgment.  He  saw  only 
beauty. 

"I  shan't  abandon  her.  I  shall  always  be  able  to 
see  as  much  of  her  as  I  did  of  Rhoda,  and  more. 
And  she  is  different  from  Rhoda.  I  shan't  have  the 
special  joy  of  her,  but  I  shall  have  the  good." 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

"Moreover,"  he  went  on,  with  perfect  gentle 
ness,  putting  her  words  aside,  "I  can't  abandon 
Rhoda.  All  that  you  have  said  is  true.  But  it 
does  n't  go  far  enough.  You  yourself,  you  know, 
see  life  too  much  in  terms  of  irony,  of  fact  rather 
than  faith.  You've  owned  that  Rhoda  is  adven 
turous  and  honest;  you've  owned  that  she  does  n't 
lie  to  herself.  Then  she  has  growth  in  her.  No  hu 
man  being  can  be  like  a  flower  or  a  fish  or  a  stone. 
It  was  mere  literature,  your  saying  that.  Every 
human  being  has  futures  and  futures  within  it. 
You  know  it  really.  Why  you  yourself,  though  you 
are  so  old  and  fixed,  are  different  now  from  what 
you  were  an  hour  ago.  I  am  different,  of  course. 
And  Rhoda  will  be  different,  too.  She  won't  dis 
integrate  me.  She'll  make  me  very  miserable, 
doubtless;  she  has  already.  And  I  shall  make  her 
angry.  But  I  shall  hold  her,  and  she'll  change.  You 
shall  see.  I  promise  you.  And  you  will  keep  Jane 
Amoret,  and  she  will  be  eternally  different  because 
of  you." 

Mrs.  Delafield,  while  he  spoke,  had  risen.  She 
stood  before  him,  grasping  her  gold  chain  on  either 
side,  her  eyes  very  nearly  level  with  his,  and  she 
summoned  all  her  will,  her  strength,  her  wisdom  to 
meet  him.  Yes,  they  had  come  to  that,  she  and 
this  boy. 

"I  accept  all  your  faith,"  she  said.  "Only  you 
must  help  me  to  make  my  world,  and  not  yours, 
with  it.  Don't  be  afraid  for  Jane  Amoret.  I  shall 
be  firmly  in  her  life.  Rhoda  shan't  keep  me  out. 
She  won't  want  to  keep  me  out.  Rhoda  has  far 
more  chance  of  changing,  of  learning  something 
from  this  experience,  as  a  disconcerted  and  for 
given  wife  than  as  a  sullen  adventuress;  and  you  — 

[S3  1 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

you  will  not  be  miserable;  not  with  Rhoda,  at  all 
events;  and  you  will  be  free.  I  am  going  to  send  a 
wire  to  Rhoda,  at  once,  and  tell  her  that  I  have  re 
considered  my  advice  to  her.  That,  in  itself,  will 
show  her  how  I  managed  her  this  morning.  I  shall 
tell  her  that  she  must  go  to  London  to-night,  to  her 
father.  And  to-morrow  I'll  take  Jane  Amoret  up 
and  bring  Rhoda  and  Niel  together." 

He  took  it  all  in,  wide-eyed,  he  too  now  measur 
ing  the  threat. 

;'You  can't,"  he  said;  "I  won't  let  you!" 

"  You  '11  have  to  let  me.  I  have  the  fact  on  my 
side  as  well  as  the  faith.  She  wants  to  leave  you. 
She  wants  only  the  excuse  of  being  asked.  You 
can't  stop  my  giving  her  the  excuse."  Yes,  after 
all,  her  fact  against  his  faith,  she  must  have  her 
way.  What  could  his  love  for  Rhoda  and  his  feel 
ing  for  herself  do  against  the  ironic  fact  that 
Rhoda,  simply,  was  tired  of  him?  "  You  must  see 
that  you  can't  force  her  to  stay,"  she  said.  "You 
could  n't  even  prevent  her  coming  to  me  this 
morning." 

She  looked  at  him  with  all  the  force  of  her  ad 
vantage  and  saw  that  before  the  cruel  fact,  and  her 
determination,  he  knew  his  helplessness.  It  was, 
again,  the  bird  arrested  in  its  impulse;  and  a  veil 
seemed  to  fall  across  his  face,  a  shyness,  almost  a 
wildness  to  shut  them  out  from  each  other.  He 
dropped  his  eyes  before  her. 

"Dear  Mr.  Darley,  my  dear  young  friend,  see 
that  it's  best.  See  that  it's  best  all  round.  See  it 
with  me,"  she  begged.  " I  was  wrong  this  morning; 
wrong  from  the  very  first.  Let  it  come  to  that 
only.  Count  yourself  out.  It  was  of  myself,  of  my 
own  delight  in  the  child  that  I  was  thinking.  No, 

[54  ] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

not  even  thinking;  I  tried  to  think  it  was  for  her; 
but  it  was  my  own  feeling  that  decided.  If  you  had 
never  come,  it  would  still  have  been  right  to  give 
her  up  —  though  I  should  never  have  seen  it  unless 
you'd  come.  It  was  almost  a  crime  that  I  com 
mitted.  They  had  asked  me  to  implore  her  to  go 
back;  they  trusted  me.  And  I  prevented  the  mes 
sage  coming  to  her.  I  did  not  believe  the  things  I 
said  to  her  —  not  as  she  thought  I  believed  them. 
I  did  not  care  a  rap  about  her  dignity;  you  saw  the 
falsity  at  once.  I  cared  only  about  keeping  Jane 
Amoret." 

He  stood  there  before  her,  remote,  unmoved, 
with  downcast,  unanswering  eyes. 

"Are  you  angry?  Don't  you  see  it,  too?"  she 
pleaded. 

"No."  He  shook  his  head.  "You  had  a  right  to 
keep  the  child." 

"Against  all  those  other  reasons?  Against  my 
own  conscience?" 

"Yes.  Because  you  were  strong  enough.  You 
were  right,  because  you  were  strong  enough.  I  be 
lieve  in  law,  too,  you  see  —  unless  one  is  strong 
enough  to  break  it  for  something  better.  You 
were.  It  was  a  beautiful  thing  to  do." 

"But  then,  if  you  think  me  so  strong,  why  not 
trust  me  now?  This,  now,  is  the  thing  I  want  to 
do." 

"Because  of  me.  It  is  n't  against  the  law  you 
are  acting  now;  it's  against  your  own  life.  I  am 
not  angry.  But  it  crushes  me." 

They  stood  there  then,  she  deeply  meditating,  he 
fixed  in  his  unyielding  grief,  for  how  long  she  could 
not  have  said.  Parton's  step  outside  broke  in  upon 
their  mute  opposition. 

[551 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 


VI 

SHE  and  Mr.  Barley,  Mrs.  Delafield  was  aware, 
presented  precisely  the  abstracted,  alienated  air 
that  Parton  would  expect.  The  young  man  moved 
away  to  the  window  while  she  took  from  the  salver 
the  note  Parton  presented.  Then,  her  hand  ar 
rested  in  the  very  act  by  a  recognition, 

"Is  there  an  answer?"  she  asked. 

"No  answer,  ma'am." 

"Who  brought  it?" 

"A  man  from  the  station,  ma'am." 

"Very  well,  Parton." 

Parton  was  gone.  Mr.  Darley  kept  his  back 
turned.  She  held  the  note  in  her  hand  and  stared 
at  it.  The  writing  was  Rhoda's;  the  envelope  one 
of  the  station-master's.  She  had  been  at  the  sta 
tion,  then,  when  she  wrote,  four  miles  away.  The 
London  train,  for  which  she  had  been  waiting,  had 
gone  long  since;  it  had  gone  before  the  arrival  of 
Mr.  Darley's. 

An  almost  overpowering  presage  rose  in  her 
mind;  she  could  hardly,  for  a  moment,  summon  the 
decision  with  which  to  open  the  envelope.  Then, 
reading  as  she  stood,  she  felt  the  blood  flow  up  to 
her  face. 

For  it  was  almost  too  much,  although  it  was, 
through  Rhoda's  act,  she  who  had  won  finally. 
Even  she,  then,  had  not  yet  correctly  measured 
Rhoda's  irony  or  Rhoda's  sardonic  assurance. 
Rhoda,  after  all,  did  not  care  to  keep  up  appear 
ances  with  her,  and,  after  all,  why  should  she? 
Here  was  fact,  and  it  had  been  fact  all  through. 
She  wanted  most  to  go  back.  She  wanted  it  more 

[56] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

than  to  be  dignified  in  her  aunt's  eyes,  or,  really,  in 
anybody  else's.  Once  back  Rhoda  would  take  care 
of  her  dignity.  In  a  flash  Mrs.  Delafield  saw  how 
little,  when  all  was  said  and  done,  Rhoda  would 
pay. 

DEAR  AUNT  ISABEL  [she  wrote,  in  her  ample,  tran 
quil  hand] :  I  Ve  been  thinking  over  all  you  said  and 
have  come  to  the  conclusion  that  you  are  consider 
ing  me  too  much.  I  feel  that  I  must  consider  my 
child.  I  have  made  a  grave  mistake  and  am  not  too 
proud  to  own  it.  Christopher  and  I  are  not  at  all 
fitted  to  make  each  other  happy.  So  I  have  wired  to 
father  that  I  arrive  this  afternoon,  and  to  Niel  that 
I  will  see  him  to-morrow.  I  have  written  too,  of 
course,  to  my  poor  Christopher.  But  he  will  un 
derstand  me.  Thank  you  so  much,  dear  Aunt  Isa 
bel,  for  your  kindness  and  helpfulness. 

Your  affectionate  RhoDA 

P.S.  Will  you  send  nurse  up  with  Jane  Amoret 
within  the  week?  Not  at  once,  please;  that  would 
look  rather  foolish. 

With  the  accumulated  weight  of  absurdity,  re 
lief,  dismay,  she  had  sunk  down  into  her  chair,  still 
gazing  at  the  letter,  and  it  was  dismay  that  grew. 
As  if  with  a  violent  jolt  back  to  earth,  Rhoda 
seemed  to  show  her  that  life  was  not  docile  to  no 
bilities.  She  hated  to  think  that  he  must  feel  with 
her  that  shattering  fall.  There  was  nothing  for 
them  to  do  now  for  each  other;  no  contest  and  no 
sacrifice.  Rhoda  had  settled  everything. 

She  spoke  to  him  at  last,  and,  as  he  came  to  her, 
not  looking  around  at  him,  she  held  out  the  note. 

is?] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

He  stood  behind  her  to  read  it;  and  after  that  he 
did  not  speak. 

She  heard  him  move  presently,  vaguely,  and 
then,  vaguely,  he  drifted  to  and  fro.  He  walked 
here  and  there;  he  paused,  no  doubt  to  feel  his 
bones  and  to  count  how  many  had  been  broken, 
and  then,  with  a  start,  he  went  on  again. 

"Please  come  where  I  can  see  you,"  she  said  at 
last. 

He  came  at  once,  obediently,  standing  as  he  had 
stood  a  little  while  ago  before  the  fire,  his  hands 
locked  behind  him,  but  now  with  face  bent  down, 
fixed  in  its  effort  to  see  clearly  what  had  happened 
to  them. 

"You  see,  it  was  over.  You  see,  you  could  n't  have 
made  anything  of  it."  It  was  almost  with  tears 
that  she  besought  him  not  to  suffer  too  much.  "  You 
have  nothing  to  regret,  except  having  believed  in 
her.  Tell  me  that  you  are  not  too  unhappy." 

"I  don't  know  what  I  am,"  Christopher  said. 
"But  I  know  I've  more  to  regret  than  having  be 
lieved  in  her.  I've  all  the  folly  and  mischief  I've 
made."  He  had  thought  it  out  and  she  could  not 
deny  what  he  had  seen,  not  even  when  he  went  on, 
"If  it  could  have  been  in  our  way,  —  yours  and 
mine,  or,  at  least,  what  was  yours  this  morning, 
when  you  thought  you  had  kept  her  with  me,  — 
everything  might  have  been  atoned  for.  It  might 
have  meant  a  certain  kind  of  beauty,  and  a  certain 
kind  of  happiness,  even,  perhaps.  But  in  this  way, 
the  way  she's  chosen,  it  only  means  just  that  — 
folly,  mischief,"  —  he  turned  to  the  fire  and  looked 
down  into  it,  —  "sin,"  he  finished. 

She  could  not  deny  it,  even  to  give  him  comfort; 
but  she  could  find  something  else.  "It  was  Rhoda 

[  58 1 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

who  chose.  You,  whatever  your  mistakes,  chose 
very  differently.  I'm  not  trying  to  shift  responsi 
bility;  to  make  mistakes  is  to  be  foolish  and  mis 
chievous.  But  can't  even  sin  be  atoned  for? 
Does  n't  it  all  now  depend  on  you  ?  That  you 
should  make  yourself  worth  it.  You  are  the  only 
one  of  us  who  can  do  that." 

He  turned  to  her  and  his  eyes  studied  her  with  an 
unaccepting  gentleness. 

"You  mean  because  I'm  a  poet?  It  isn't  like 
you,  really,  to  say  that.  You  don't  believe  in  poets 
and  their  mission  in  that  sense.  It's  too  facile." 

"Not  only  because  you  are  a  poet.  I  was  n't 
thinking  so  much  of  that,  although  your  gift  helps. 
But  simply  because  you  are  young  and  good." 

"I'm  not  good  enough,"  said  Christopher. 
"And  I'm  too  young.  You've  shown  me  that.  I 
am  afraid  of  myself.  I  see  what  one  can  do  while 
meaning  the  best." 

She  watched  him  with  grave  tenderness,  feeling 
again,  in  his  dispassionate  capacity  for  accepted 
experience,  his  strange  maturity.  And  knowing  all 
that  might  be  difficult,  yet  knowing  that  it  would 
be,  after  all,  to  a  decision  like  her  own,  the  merest 
gossamers  of  convention  that  she  must  brave,  she 
said,  —  and  as  she  looked  up  at  him  his  face 
seemed  to  blend  with  the  face  of  her  little,  sleeping, 
lost  Jane  Amoret,  —  "Don't  you  think  I,  perhaps, 
could  be  of  help,  while  you  are  so  young?" 

He  did  not  understand  her  at  all.  He,  too,  was 
absorbed  in  his  inner  image  of  loss,  yet  he,  too,  was 
almost  as  aware  of  her  as  she  of  him,  and  his  eyes, 
with  their  austere  gentleness,  dwelt  on  her,  as  if 
treasuring,  of  this  last  encounter,  his  completed 
vision  of  her. 

[59] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

"Yes,  you  will  be.  I  shall  never  forget  you  and 
what  you've  been  to  me.  I'll  do  my  best,"  he 
promised  her.  "But  I  seem  to  have  lost  every 
thing.  I  could  be  strong  for  her;  I  don't  know  that 
I  can  be  strong  enough  for  myself." 

"That's  what  I  mean,"  said  Mrs.  Delafield.  "It 
takes  years  to  be  strong  enough  for  one's  self,  and 
even  when  one 's  old  one  has  n't  sometimes  learned 
how  to  be.  I'm  not  sure,  after  this  morning,  that 
I  Ve  learned  yet.  But  I  know  that  I  could  be  strong 
for  you.  Will  you  let  me  try?  Will  you  let  me  take 
care  of  you  a  little  and  guard  you  from  the  Rhodas 
until  the  right  person  comes?" 

"What  do  you  mean?"  he  asked;  and,  answering 
the  look  in  her  face,  tears  sprang  to  his  eyes. 

"We  belong  to  each  other.  Did  n't  you  say  it?" 
she  smiled.  "We  are  friends.  We  ought  not  to  lose 
each  other  now." 

"Oh!  But-  '  He  gazed  at  her.  "How  could 
you!  After  what  I've  done!" 

"You've  done  nothing  that  makes  me  like  you 
less." 

"Oh  —  I  can't!  I  can't!"  said  Christopher  Dar- 
ley.  "How  could  I  accept  it  from  you?  Already 
you've  been  unbelievably  beautiful  to  me.  It's 
not  as  if  you  were  a  Bohemian  sort  of  creature,  like 
me.  Appearances  must  count  for  you.  And  the 
appearance  of  being  friends  with  your  niece's  dis 
carded  lover  —  no  —  I  can't  see  it  for  you.  I  can 
imagine  you  being  above  the  law,  but  I  can't  im 
agine  you  being  above  appearances.  I  don't  think 
that  I  should  want  you  to  be.  I  care  about  appear 
ances,  too,  when  they  are  yours." 

It  crossed  her  mind,  with  almost  a  mirthful  sense 
of  the  sort  of  appearances  she  would  have  to  deal 

[  60  1 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

with,  that  Parton's  face  would  be  worth  watching. 
Poor  Tim's  hovered  more  grievously  in  the  back 
ground.  But,  after  all,  it  would  be  a  Tim  with 
wounds  well  salved. 

"It's  just  because  mine  are  so  secure  and  recog 
nized,  don't  you  see,  that  I  can  do  what  I  like  with 
them,"  she  said.  "It's  not  for  me  a  question  of 
appearances,  but  of  realities.  After  all,  my  dear 
young  man,  what  am  I  going  to  get  out  of  it  all? 
My  roots  have  been  torn  up  too,  you  know." 

"Because  of  me!  Because  of  me!"  Christopher 
groaned.  "Do  you  think  you  need  remind  me  of 
that?  Shall  I  ever  forgive  myself  for  it?  Get  out  of 
it?  You'll  get  nothing.  You've  been  tormented 
between  us  all,  and  you  lose  Jane  Amoret." 

"Then  don't  let  me  lose  you  too,"  said  Mrs. 
Delafield. 

Again,  with  the  tears,  his  blush  sprang  to  his 
face,  and  he  stood  there  incredulous,  looking  down 
at  her,  almost  as  helpless  in  the  shyness  the  unex 
pected  gift  brought  upon  him  as  he  had  been  when 
he  first  came  in  to  her. 

"Really  you  mean  it?"  he  murmured.  "Really 
I  can  do  something  for  you,  too?  Because,  unless  I 
can,  I  could  n't  accept  it." 

"You  can  make  me  much  less  lonely,  when  she's 
gone,"  said  Mrs.  Delafield. 

She  knew  that  this  was  to  give  the  gift  in  such  a 
way  as  to  ensure  its  acceptance;  but  he  murmured, 
stung  again  intolerably  by  the  thought  of  Jane 
Amoret,  "Oh  —  I  can't  bear  it  for  you!" 

"You  can  help  me  to  bear  it." 

Still  he  pressed  upon  her  what  he  saw  as  her 
sacrifice. 

"You  mean  that  I  may  see  you  when  I  like?  I 

[61  ] 


CHRISTMAS  ROSES 

may  always  write  and  you  '11  always  answer?  I  can 
sometimes,  even,  come  and  stay,  like  any  other 
friend?  Please  realize  that  if  you  let  me  come 
down  on  you  like  that,  I  may  come  hard.  Pm 
frightfully  lonely,  too." 

"As  hard  as  you  like.  I  want  you  to  come  hard. 
Like  any  friend.  Yes." 

She  was  smiling  up  at  the  young  man,  and,  as 
she  had  promised  herself  years  for  Jane  Amoret, 
she  promised  herself  now  years  —  though  not  so 
many  would  be  needed  —  for  Christopher  Darley. 
It  was  in  the  thought  of  what  she  could  do  for 
Christopher  Darley  that  she  saw  Rhoda's  punish 
ment.  Not  for  having  left  him,  but  for  having 
taken  him;  for  not  having  known  what  to  do  with 
him  without  taking  him.  And  Rhoda  would  see  it 
with  her,  if  no  one  else  did. 

"Come,  you  must  quite  believe  in  me,"  she  said. 
"Give  me  your  hand,  dear  Christopher,  and  tell 
me  that  you  take  this  meddling,  commanding  old 
woman  to  be  your  friend." 

He  had  no  words  as  he  took  the  hand  she  gave 
him,  but  from  his  look  it  might  have  been  as  if  he  at 
last  received  into  his  keeping  the  great  gift,  the 
precious  casket  of  the  future;  and  his  eyes,  like 
those  of  a  devout  young  knight,  dedicated  them 
selves  to  her  service. 

It  was  again  gift  and  miracle;  and  though  in  her 
mind  was  the  thought  of  all  her  mournings,  and  of 
the  lost  Jane  Amoret,  she  felt,  rooting  itself  in  the 
darkness  and  sorrow,  yet  another  flower. 

"And  now,"  she  said,  for  they  must  not  both  be 
gin  to  cry,  "please  ring  the  bell  for  me.  The  time 
has  not  quite  come  for  your  first  visit;  but,  before 
you  go,  we  will  have  our  first  tea  together." 


HEPATIC  AS 


people's  sons  were  coming 
home  for  the  three  or  four  days' 
leave.  The  first  gigantic  struggle 
—  furious  onslaught  and  grim  re 
sistance  —  was  over.  Paris,  pale, 
and  slightly  shuddering  still,  stood 
safe.  Calais  was  not  taken,  and, 
dug  into  their  trenches,  it  was  evident  that  the 
opposing  armies  would  lie  face  to  face  with  no  de 
cisive  encounter  possible  until  the  spring. 

There  was,  with  all  their  beauty  and  terror,  an 
element  of  the  facetious  in  these  unexpected  holi 
days,  of  the  matter-of-factness,  the  freedom  from 
strain  or  sentiment  that  was  the  English  oddity 
and  the  English  strength.  Men  who  had  known 
the  horrors  of  the  retreat  from  Mons  or  the  carnage 
of  Ypres,  who  had  not  taken  off  their  clothes  for 
ten  days  at  a  stretch  or  slept  for  four  nights,  came 
home  from  trenches  knee-deep  in  mud,  from  battle 
fields  heaped  with  unburied  dead,  and  appeared 
immaculate  and  cheerful  at  breakfast;  a  little  sober 
and  preoccupied,  perhaps;  touched,  perhaps,  with 
strangeness;  but  ready  for  the  valorous  family  jest, 
and  alluding  to  the  war  as  if,  while  something  too 
solemn  for  adequate  comment,  it  were  yet  some 
thing  that  lent  itself  to  laughter.  One  did  such 
funny  things,  and  saw  them;  of  the  other  things 


HEP  AT  I  CAS 

one  did  not  speak;  and  there  was  the  huge  standing 
joke  of  an  enemy  who  actually  hated  one.  These 
grave  and  cheerful  young  men  hated  nobody;  but 
they  were  very  eager  to  go  back  again;  and  they 
were  all  ready,  not  only  to  die  but  to  die  good- 
humouredly.  From  the  demeanour  of  mothers  and 
wives  and  sisters  it  was  evident  that  nothing  would 
be  said  or  done  to  make  this  readiness  difficult;  but 
Mrs.  Bradley,  who  showed  serenity  to  the  world 
and  did  not  even  when  alone  allow  herself  to  cry, 
suspected  that  the  others,  beneath  their  smiles, 
carried  hearts  as  heavy  with  dread  as  her  own. 

It  had  been  heavy,  with  hope  now  as  well  as  with 
dread,  for  the  past  week.  It  was  a  week  since  she 
had  last  heard  from  Jack.  Mrs.  Crawley  over  the 
hill,  had  had  a  wire,  and  her  husband  was  now  with 
her;  and  Lady  Wrexham  expected  her  boy  to-mor 
row.  There  was  no  certainty  at  all  as  regarded  her 
self;  yet  at  any  moment  she  might  have  her  wire; 
and  feeling  to-day  the  stress  of  waiting  too  great  to 
be  borne  in  passivity,  she  left  her  books  and  letters 
and  put  on  her  gardening  shoes  and  gloves  and 
went  out  to  her  borders. 

For  weeks  now  the  incessant  rain  had  made  the 
relief  and  solace  of  gardening  almost  an  impossibil 
ity;  but  to-day  was  mild  and  clear.  There  was  no 
radiance  in  the  air;  curtains  of  pearly  mist  shut  out 
the  sky;  yet  here  and  there  a  soft  opening  in  the 
white  showed  a  pale,  far  blue,  gentle  and  remote 
as  the  gaze  of  a  wandering  goddess,  and  the  hills 
seemed  to  smile  quietly  up  at  the  unseen  sun.  Mrs. 
Bradley,  as  she  went  along  the  river-path,  could 
look  across  at  the  hills;  the  river-path  and  the  hills 
were  the  great  feature  of  Dorrington,  —  the  placid, 
comely  red  brick  house  to  which  she  and  Jack  had 


HEPATICAS 

come  fifteen  years  ago,  after  the  death  of  her  hus 
band  in  India.  Enclosed  by  woods,  and  almost 
catching  sight  of  the  road,  —  from  its  upper  win 
dows  and  over  its  old  brick  wall,  —  the  house 
would  have  seemed  to  her  too  commonplace  and 
almost  suburban,  in  spite  of  the  indubitably  old 
oak-panelling  of  the  drawing-room,  had  it  not  been 
for  the  river  and  the  hills.  Stepping  out  on  to  the 
lawn  from  the  windows  of  the  drawing-room,  she 
and  Jack,  on  that  April  day,  had  found  themselves 
confronting  both  —  the  limpid,  rapid  little  stream, 
spanned  near  the  house  by  its  mossy  bridge,  and 
the  hills,  beyond  the  meadows,  streaked  with  pur 
ple  woodlands  and  rising,  above  the  woods,  to 
slopes  russet,  fawn,  and  azure.  Jack,  holding  her 
by  the  hand,  had  pointed  at  once  with  an  eager 
"Isn't  it  pretty,  mummy!"  —  even  at  eight  he 
had  cared  almost  as  much  as  she,  and  extraordina 
rily  in  the  same  way,  for  the  sights  of  the  country; 
and  if  the  hills  had  n't  settled  the  question,  it  was 
settled,  quite  finally,  ten  minutes  later,  by  the 
white  hepaticas. 

They  had  come  upon  them  suddenly,  after  their 
tour  of  the  walled  kitchen  garden  and  their  survey 
of  the  lawn  with  its  ugly  shrubberies,  —  now  long 
forgotten,  —  penetrating  a  thicket  of  hazels  and 
finding  themselves  in  an  opening  under  trees  where 
neighbouring  woods  looked  at  them  over  an  old 
stone  wall,  and  where,  from  an  old  stone  bench, 
one  could  see  the  river.  The  ground  was  soft  with 
the  fallen  leaves  of  many  an  autumn;  a  narrow 
path  ran,  half  obliterated,  down  to  the  river;  and 
among  the  faded  brown,  everywhere,  rose  the 
thick  clusters,  the  dark  leaves,  and  the  snowy 
flowers,  —  poignant,  amazing  in  their  beauty. 


HEP  AT  I  CAS 

She  and  Jack  had  stopped  short  to  gaze.  She 
had  never  before  seen  such  white  hepaticas,  or  so 
many,  or  so  placed.  And  Jack,  presently,  lifting 
his  dear  nut-brown  head  and  nut-brown  eyes,  had 
said,  gazing  up  at  her  as  he  had  gazed  at  the  flow 
ers,  "They  are  just  like  you,  mummy." 

She  had  felt  at  once  that  they  were  like  her; 
more  like  than  the  little  boy's  instinct  could  grasp. 
He  had  thought  of  the  darkness  and  whiteness;  her 
widow's  weeds  and  pale  face  had  suggested  that; 
but  he  could  not  know  the  sorrow,  the  longing,  the 
earthly  sense  of  irreparable  loss,  the  heavenly 
sense  of  a  possession  unalterably  hers,  that  the 
dark,  melancholy  leaves  and  celestial  whiteness  of 
the  flowers  expressed  to  her.  Tears  had  risen  to  her 
eyes  and  she  had  stooped  and  kissed  her  child,  — 
how  like  her  husband's  that  little  face!  —  and  had 
said,  after  a  moment,  "  We  must  never  leave  them, 
Jack." 

They  had  never  left  them.  Dorrington  had  been 
their  home  for  fifteen  years,  and  the  hepaticas  the 
heart  of  it.  It  had  always  seemed  to  them  both  the 
loveliest  ritual  of  the  year,  that  early  spring  one 
when,  in  the  hazel  copse,  they  would  find  the  white 
hepaticas  again  in  flower.  And  of  all  the  garden  la 
bours  none  were  sweeter  than  those  that  cherished 
and  divided  and  protected  the  beloved  flowers. 

Mrs.  Bradley,  to-day,  worked  in  her  long  border, 
weeding,  forking,  placing  belated  labels.  She  was 
dressed  in  black,  her  straw  hat  bound  beneath  her 
chin  by  a  ribbon  and  her  soft  gardening  gloves 
rolling  back  from  her  firm,  white  wrists.  Her  ges 
tures  expressed  a  calm  energy,  an  accurate  grace. 
She  was  tall,  and  when  she  raised  herself  to  look 
over  the  meadows  at  the  hills,  she  showed  small, 

[  66  1 


HEP  AT  I  CAS 

decisive  features,  all  marked,  in  the  pallor  of  her 
face,  as  if  with  the  delicate,  neutral  emphasis  of  an 
etching:  the  grey,  scrutinizing  eyes,  the  charming 
yet  ugly  nose,  the  tranquil  mouth  that  had,  at  the 
corners,  a  little  fall,  half  sweet,  half  bitter,  as  if 
with  tears  repressed  or  a  summoned  smile.  Squared 
at  brow  and  chin,  it  would,  but  for  the  mildness  of 
the  gaze,  have  been  an  imperious  face;  and  her 
head,  its  whitened  hair  drawn  back  and  looped  in 
wide  braids  behind,  had  an  air  at  once  majestic  and 
unworldly. 

She  had  worked  for  over  an  hour  and  the  last 
label  was  set  beside  a  precious  clump  of  iris.  The 
hazel  copse  lay  near  by;  and  gathering  up  her  tools, 
drawing  off  her  wet  gloves,  she  followed  the  path 
under  the  leafless  branches  and  among  thehepatica 
leaves  to  the  stone  bench,  where,  sinking  down, 
she  knew  that  she  was  very  tired.  She  could  see, 
below  the  bank,  the  dark,  quick  stream;  a  pale, 
diffused  light  in  the  sky  showed  where  the  sun  was 
dropping  toward  the  hills. 

Where  was  Jack  at  this  moment,  this  quiet 
moment  of  a  monotonous  English  winter  day?  — 
so  like  the  days  of  all  the  other  years  that  it  was 
impossible  to  think  of  what  was  happening  a  few 
hours'  journey  away  across  the  Channel.  Impossi 
ble  to  think  of  it;  yet  the  thick  throb  of  her  heart 
spoke  to  the  full  of  its  significance.  She  had  told 
herself  from  the  beginning  —  passionate,  rebellious 
creature  as,  at  bottom,  she  knew  herself  to  be,  al 
ways  in  need  of  discipline  and  only  in  these  later 
years  schooled  to  a  control  and  submission  that,  in 
her  youth,  she  would  have  believed  impossible  to 
her  —  she  had  told  herself,  when  he  had  gone  from 
her,  that,  as  a  soldier's  widow,  she  must  see  her 


HEPATICAS 

soldier  son  go  to  death.  She  must  give  him  to  that; 
be  ready  for  it;  and  if  he  came  back  to  her  it  would 
be  as  if  he  were  born  again,  a  gift,  a  grace,  unex 
pected  and  unclaimed.  She  must  feel,  for  herself  as 
well  as  for  her  country,  that  these  days  of  dread 
were  also  days  of  a  splendour  and  beauty  unmatched 
by  any  in  England's  history,  and  that  a  soldier's 
widow  must  ask  for  no  more  glorious  fate  for  her 
son  than  death  in  such  a  cause.  She  had  told  her 
self  all  this  many  times;  yet,  as  she  sat  there,  her 
hands  folded  on  her  lap,  her  eyes  on  the  stream 
below,  she  felt  that  she  was  now  merely  mother 
hood,  tense,  huddled,  throbbing  and  longing,  long 
ing  for  its  child. 

Then,  suddenly,  she  heard  Jack's  footsteps.  They 
came,  quick  and  light,  along  the  garden  path;  they 
entered  the  wood;  they  were  near,  but  softened  by 
the  fallen  leaves.  And,  half  rising,  afraid  of  her 
own  joy,  she  hardly  knew  that  she  saw  him  before 
she  was  in  his  arms;  and  it  was  better  to  meet  thus, 
in  the  blindness  and  darkness  of  their  embrace,  her 
cheek  pressed  against  his  hair,  his  head  buried 
close  between  her  neck  and  shoulder. 

"Jack!  —  Jack!"  she  heard  herself  say. 

He  said  nothing,  holding  her  tightly  to  him,  with 
quick  breaths;  and  even  after  she  had  opened  her 
eyes  and  could  look  down  at  him,  —  her  own,  her 
dear,  beautiful  Jack,  —  could  see  the  nut-brown 
head,  the  smooth  brown  cheek,  the  firm  brown 
hand  which  grasped  her,  he  did  not  for  a  long  time 
raise  his  head  and  look  at  her.  When,  at  last,  he 
did  look  up,  she  could  not  tell,  through  her  tears, 
whether,  like  herself,  he  was  trying  to  smile. 

They  sat  down  together  on  the  bench.  She  did 
not  ask  him  why  he  had  not  wired.  That  question 

[681 


HEP  AT  1C  AS 

pressed  too  sharply  on  her  heart;  to  ask  might  seem 
to  reproach. 

"  Darling  —  you  are  so  thin,  —  so  much  older, 
—  but  you  look  —  strong  and  well." 

"We're  all  of  us  extraordinarily  fit,  mummy. 
It's  wholesome,  living  in  mud." 

"And  wholesome  living  among  bursting  shells? 
I  had  your  last  letter  telling  of  that  miraculous 
escape." 

"There  have  been  a  lot  more  since  then.  Every 
day  seems  a  miracle  —  that  one 's  alive  at  the  end 
of  it." 

"But  you  get  used  to  it?" 

"All  except  the  noise.  That  always  seems  to 
daze  me  still.  Some  of  our  fellows  are  deaf  from 
it.  —  You  heard  of  Toppie,  mother?"  Jack  asked. 

Toppie  was  Alan  Graham,  Jack's  nearest  friend. 
He  had  been  killed  ten  days  before. 
•  "I  heard  it,  Jack.   Were  you  with  him?" 

"Yes.  It  was  in  a  bayonet  charge.  He  did  n't 
suffer.  A  bullet  went  right  through  him.  He  just 
gave  a  little  cry  and  fell."  Jack's  voice  had  the 
mildness  of  a  sorrow  that  has  passed  beyond  the 
capacity  for  emotion.  "We  found  him  afterwards. 
He  is  buried  out  there." 

"You  must  tell  Frances  about  it,  Jack.  I  went 
to  her  at  once."  Frances  was  Toppie's  sister.  "  She 
is  bearing  it  so  bravely." 

"I  must  write  to  her.  She  would  be  sure  to  be 
plucky." 

He  answered  all  her  questions,  sitting  closely 
against  her,  his  arm  around  her;  looking  down, 
while  he  spoke,  and  twisting,  as  had  always  been 
his  boyish  way,  a  button  on  her  coat.  He  was  at 
that  enchanting  moment  of  young  manhood  when 


HEP  AT  I  CAS 

the  child  is  still  apparent  in  the  man.  His  glance 
was  shy  yet  candid;  his  small,  firm  lips  had  a  child's 
gravity.  With  his  splendid  shoulders,  long  legs, 
and  noble  little  head,  he  was  yet  as  endearing  as 
he  was  impressive.  His  mother's  heart  ached  with 
love  and  pride  and  fear  as  she  gazed  at  him. 

And  a  question  came,  near  the  sharp  one,  yet 
hoping  to  evade  it:  — 

"Jack,  dearest,  how  long  will  you  be  with  me? 
How  long  is  the  leave?" 

He  raised  his  eyes  then  and  looked  at  her;  a 
curious  look.  Something  in  it  blurred  her  mind 
with  a  sense  of  some  other  sort  of  fear. 

"Only  till  to-night,"  he  said. 

It  seemed  confusion  rather  than  pain  that  she 
felt.  "Only  till  to-night,  Jack?  But  Richard  Craw- 
ley  has  been  back  for  three  days  already.  I  thought 
they  gave  you  longer?" 

"I  know,  mummy."  His  eyes  were  dropped 
again  and  his  hand  at  the  button  —  did  it  trem 
ble? —  twisted  and  untwisted.  "I've  been  back 
for  three  days  already.  —  I've  been  in  London." 

"In  London?"  Her  breath  failed  her.  The  sense 
of  alien  fear  became  a  fog,  horrible,  suffocating. 
"But  — Jack  — why?" 

"I  did  n't  wrire,  mummy,  because  I  knew  I'd 
have  to  be  there  for  most  of  my  time.  I  felt  I 
could  n't  wire  and  tell  you.  I  felt  I  had  to  see  you 
when  I  told  you.  Mother  —  I'm  married.  —  I 
came  back  to  get  married.  —  I  was  married  this 
morning.  —  Oh,  mother,  can  you  ever  forgive  me?" 

His  shaking  hands  held  her  and  his  eyes  could 
not  meet  hers. 

She  felt  the  blood  rush,  as  if  her  heart  had  been 
divided  with  a  sword,  to  her  throat,  to  her  eyes, 

[70] 


HEP  AT  I  CAS 

choking  her,  burning  her;  and  as  if  from  far  away 
she  heard  her  own  voice  saving,  after  a  little  time 
had  passed,  " There's  nothing  I  could  n't  forgive 
you,  Jack.  Tell  me.  Don't  be  afraid  of  hurting 


me." 


He  held  her  tightly,  still  looking  down  as  he  said, 
"She  is  a  dancer,  mother,  a  little  dancer.  It  was  in 
London,  last  summer.  A  lot  of  us  came  up  from 
Aldershot  together.  She  was  in  the  chorus  of  one 
of  those  musical  comedies.  Mother,  you  can  never 
understand.  But  it  was  n't  just  low  and  vulgar. 
She  was  so  lovely,  —  so  very  young,  —  with  the 
most  wonderful  golden  hair  and  the  sweetest  eyes. 
—  I  don't  know.  —  I  simply  went  off  my  head 
when  I  saw  her.  We  all  had  supper  together  af 
terwards.  Toppie  knew  one  of  the  other  girls, 
and  Dollie  was  there.  That 's  her  name  —  Dollie 
Vaughan — her  stage  name.  Her  real  name  was  Wat 
son.  Her  people,  I  think,  were  little  tradespeo 
ple,  and  she'd  lost  her  father  and  mother, and  an 
aunt  had  been  very  unkind.  She  told  me  all  about 
it  that  night.  Mother,  please  believe  just  this:  it 
was  n't  only  the  obvious  thing.  —  I  know  I  can't 
explain.  But  you  remember,  when  we  read  War 
and  Peace"  —  his  broken  voice  groped  for  the 
analogy  —  "You  remember  Natacha,  when  she 
falls  in  love  with  Anatole,  and  nothing  that  was 
real  before  seems  real,  and  she  is  ready  for  any 
thing.  —  It  was  like  that.  It  was  all  fairyland,  like 
that.  No  one  thought  it  wrong.  It  did  n't  seem 
wrong.  Everything  went  together." 

She  had  gathered  his  hand  closely  in  hers  and 
she  sat  there,  quiet,  looking  at  her  hopes  lying  slain 
before  her.  Her  Jack.  The  wife  who  was,  perhaps, 
to  have  been  his.  The  children  that  she,  perhaps, 


HEPATICAS 

should  have  seen.  All  dead.  The  future  blotted 
out.  Only  this  wraith-like  present;  only  this 
moment  of  decision;  Jack  and  his  desperate  need 
the  only  real  things  left. 

And  after  a  moment,  for  his  labouring  breath 
had  failed,  she  said,  "Yes,  dear?"  and  smiled  at 
him. 

He  covered  his  face  with  his  hands.  "Mother, 
I've  ruined  your  life." 

He  had,  of  course,  in  ruining  his  own;  yet  even 
at  that  moment  of  wreckage  she  was  able  to  re 
member,  if  not  to  feel,  that  life  could  mend  from 
terrible  wounds,  could  marvellously  grow  from 
compromises  and  defeats.  "No,  dearest,  no,"  she 
said.  "While  I  have  you,  nothing  is  ruined.  We  shall 
see  what  can  be  done.  Go  on.  Tell  me  the  rest." 

He  put  out  his  hand  to  hers  again  and  sat  now  a 
little  turned  away  from  her,  speaking  on  in  his 
deadened,  bitter  voice. 

"There  was  n't  any  glamour  after  that  first  time. 
I  only  saw  her  once  or  twice  again.  I  was  awfully 
sorry  and  ashamed  over  the  whole  thing.  Her 
company  left  London,  on  tour,  and  then  the  war 
came,  and  I  simply  forgot  all  about  her.  And  the 
other  day,  over  there,  I  had  a  letter  from  her.  She 
was  in  terrible  trouble.  She  was  ill  and  had  no 
money,  and  no  work.  And  she  was  going  to  have  a 
child  —  my  child;  and  she  begged  me  to  send  her 
a  little  money  to  help  her  through,  or  she  did  n't 
know  what  would  become  of  her." 

The  fog,  the  horrible  confusion,  even  the  despair, 
had  passed  now.  The  sense  of  ruin,  of  wreckage 
almost  irreparable,  was  there;  yet  with  it,  too,  was 
the  strangest  sense  of  gladness.  He  was  her  own 
Jack,  completely  hers,  for  she  saw  now  why  he  had 

[72] 


HEPATICAS 

done  it;  she  could  be  glad  that  he  had  done  it. 
"Go  on,  dear,"  she  said.  "I  understand;  I  under 
stand  perfectly." 

"O  mother,  bless  you!"  He  put  her  hand  to  his 
lips,  bowing  his  head  upon  it  for  a  moment.  "  I  was 
afraid  you  could  n't.  I  was  afraid  you  could  n't 
forgive  me.  But  I  had  to  do  it.  I  thought  it  all 
over  —  out  there.  Everything  had  become  so 
different  after  what  one  had  been  through.  One 
saw  everything  differently.  Some  things  did  n't 
matter  at  all,  and  other  things  mattered  tremen 
dously.  This  was  one  of  them.  I  knew  I  could  n't 
just  send  her  money.  I  knew  I  could  n't  bear  to 
have  the  poor  child  born  without  a  name  and  with 
only  that  foolish  little  mother  to  take  care  of  it. 
And  when  I  found  I  could  get  this  leave,  I  knew  I 
must  marry  her.  That  was  why  I  did  n't  wire.  I 
thought  I  might  not  have  time  to  come  to  you  at 
all." 

"Where  is  she,  Jack?"  Her  voice,  her  eyes,  her 
smile  at  him,  showed  him  that,  indeed,  she  under 
stood  perfectly. 

"In  lodgings  that  I  found  for  her;  nice  and  quiet, 
with  a  kind  landlady.  She  was  in  such  an  awful  place 
in  Ealing.  She  is  so  changed,  poor  little  thing.  I 
should  hardly  have  known  her.  Mother,  darling, 
I  wonder,  could  you  just  go  and  see  her  once  or 
twice?  She's  frightfully  lonely;  and  so  very  young. 
—  If  you  could.  —  If  you  would  just  help  things 
along  a  little  till  the  baby  comes,  I  should  be  so 
grateful.  And,  then,  if  I  don't  come  back,  will  you, 
for  my  sake,  see  that  they  are  safe?" 

"But,  Jack,"  she  said,  smiling  at  him,  "she  is 
coming  here,  of  course.  I  shall  go  and  get  her  to 


morrow." 


[73] 


HEP  AT  I  CAS 

He  stared  at  her  and  his  colour  rose.  "Get  her? 
Bring  her  here,  to  stay?" 

"Of  course,  darling.  And  if  you  don't  come 
back,  I  will  take  care  of  them,  always." 

"But,  mother,"  said  Jack,  and  there  were  tears 
in  his  eyes,  "you  don't  know,  you  don't  realize. 
I  mean  —  she's  a  dear  little  thing  —  but  you 
could  n't  be  happy  with  her.  She'd  get  most 
frightfully  on  your  nerves.  She 's  just  —  just  a  silly 
little  dancer  who  has  got  into  trouble." 

Jack  was  clear-sighted.  Every  vestige  of  fairy 
land  had  vanished.  And  she  was  deeply  thankful 
that  they  should  see  alike,  while  she  answered, 
"It's  not  exactly  a  time  for  considering  one's 
nerves,  is  it,  Jack?  I  hope  I  shan't  get  on  hers.  I 
must  just  try  and  make  her  as  happy  as  I  can." 

She  made  it  all  seem  natural  and  almost  sweet. 
The  tears  were  in  his  eyes,  yet  he  had  to  smile  back 
at  her  when  she  said,  "You  know  that  I  am  good  at 
managing  people.  I'll  manage  her.  And  perhaps 
when  you  come  back,  my  darling,  she  won't  be  a 
silly  little  dancer." 

They  sat  now  for  a  little  while  in  silence.  While 
they  had  talked,  a  golden  sunset,  slowly,  had  il 
luminated  the  western  sky.  The  river  below  them 
was  golden,  and  the  wintry  woodlands  bathed  in 
light.  Jack  held  her  hands  and  gazed  at  her.  Love 
could  say  no  more  than  his  eyes,  in  their  trust  and 
sorrow,  said  to  her;  she  could  never  more  completely 
possess  her  son.  Sitting  there  with  him,  hand  in 
hand,  while  the  light  slowly  ebbed  and  twilight  fell 
about  them,  she  felt  it  to  be,  in  its  accepted  sorrow, 
the  culminating  and  transfiguring  moment  of  her 
maternity. 

When  they  at  last  rose  to  go  it  was  the  hour  for 

[  74l 


HEPATICAS 

Jack's  departure,  and  it  had  become  almost  dark. 
Far  away,  through  the  trees,  they  could  see  the 
lighted  windows  of  the  house  that  waited  for  them, 
but  to  which  she  must  return  alone.  With  his 
arms  around  her  shoulders,  Jack  paused  a  mo 
ment,  looking  about  him.  "Do  you  remember 
that  day  — when  we  first  came  here,  mummy?" 
he  asked. 

She  felt  in  him  suddenly  a  sadness  deeper  than 
any  he  had  yet  shown  her.  The  burden  of  the  past 
she  had  lifted  from  him;  but  he  must  bear  now  the 
burden  of  what  he  had  done  to  her,  to  their  life,  to 
all  the  future.  And,  protesting  against  his  pain, 
her  mother's  heart  strove  still  to  shelter  him  while 
she  answered,  as  if  she  did  not  feel  his  sadness, 
"Yes,  dear,  and  do  you  remember  the  hepaticas  on 
that  day?" 

"Like  you,"  said  Jack  in  a  gentle  voice.  "I  can 
hardly  see  the  plants.  Are  they  all  right?" 

"They  are  doing  beautifully." 

"I  wish  the  flowers  were  out,"  said  Jack.  "I 
wish  it  were  the  time  for  the  flowers  to  be  out,  so 
that  I  could  have  seen  you  and  them  together,  like 
that  first  day."  And  then,  putting  his  head  down  on 
her  shoulder,  he  murmured,  "It  will  never  be  the 
same  again.  I've  spoiled  everything  for  you." 

But  he  was  not  to  go  from  her  uncomforted.  She 
found  the  firmest  voice  in  which  to  answer  him, 
stroking  his  hair  and  pressing  him  to  her  with  the 
full  reassurance  of  her  resolution.  "Nothing  is 
spoiled,  Jack,  nothing.  You  have  never  been  so 
near  me  —  so  how  can  anything  be  spoiled  ?  And 
when  you  come  back,  darling,  you'll  find  your  son, 
perhaps;  and  the  hepaticas  may  be  in  flower,  wait 
ing  for  you." 

[75] 


HEPATICAS 


II 

MRS.  BRADLEY  and  her  daughter-in-law  sat  to 
gether  in  the  drawing-room.  They  sat  opposite 
each  other  on  the  two  chintz  chesterfields  placed  at 
right  angles  to  the  pleasantly  blazing  fire,  the  chintz 
curtains  drawn  against  a  rainy  evening.  It  was  a 
long,  low  room,  with  panelled  walls;  and,  like  Mrs. 
Bradley's  head,  it  had  an  air  at  once  majestic, 
decorated,  and  old-fashioned.  It  was  a  rather 
crowded  room,  with  many  deep  chairs  and  large 
couches,  many  tables  with  lamps  and  books  and 
photographs  upon  them,  many  porcelains,  prints, 
and  pots  of  growing  flowers.  Mrs.  Bradley,  her 
tea-table  before  her,  was  in  her  evening  black  silk; 
lace  ruffles  rose  about  her  throat;  she  wore  her 
accustomed  necklace  of  old  enamel,  blue,  black, 
and  white,  set  with  small  diamonds,  and  the  enamel 
locket  that  had  within  it  Jack's  face  on  one  side  and 
his  father's  on  the  other;  her  white  hands,  moving 
gently  among  the  teacups,  showed  an  ancient 
cluster  of  diamonds  above  the  slender  wedding- 
ring.  From  time  to  time  she  lifted  her  eyes  and 
smiled  quietly  over  at  her  daughter-in-law.  It  was 
the  first  time  that  she  had  really  seen  Dollie,  that 
is,  in  any  sense  that  meant  contemplative  observa 
tion.  Dollie  had  spent  her  first  week  at  Dorrington 
in  bed,  sodden  with  fatigue  rather  than  ill.  "What 
you  need,"  Mrs.  Bradley  had  said,  "is  to  go  to 
sleep  for  a  fortnight";  and  Dollie  had  almost  liter 
ally  carried  out  the  prescription. 

Stealing  carefully  into  the  darkened  room,  with 
its  flowers  and  open  windows  and  steadily  glowing 
fire,  Mrs.  Bradley  had  stood  and  looked  for  long 

[76] 


HEP  AT  I  CAS 

moments  at  all  that  she  could  see  of  her  daughter- 
in-law,  —  a  flushed,  almost  babyish  face  lying  on 
the  pillow  between  thick  golden  braids,  sleeping  so 
deeply,  so  unconsciously,  —  her  sleep  making  her 
mother-in-law  think  of  a  little  boat  gliding  slowly 
yet  steadily  on  and  on,  between  new  shores;  so 
that,  when  she  was  to  awake  and  look  about  her, 
it  would  be  as  if,  with  no  bewilderment  or  readjust 
ment,  she  found  herself  transformed,  a  denizen  of 
an  altered  world.  That  was  what  Mrs.  Bradley 
wanted,  that  Dollie  should  become  an  inmate  of 
Dorrington  with  as  little  effort  or  consciousness 
for  any  of  them  as  possible,  and  the  drowsy  days 
and  nights  of  infantine  slumbers  seemed  indeed  to 
have  brought  her  very  near. 

She  and  Pickering,  the  admirable  woman  who 
filled  so  skilfully  the  combined  positions  of  lady's 
maid  and  parlourmaid  in  her  little  establishment, 
had  braided  Dollie's  thick  tresses,  one  on  either 
side,  —  Mrs.  Bradley  laughing  a  little  and  both 
older  women  touched,  almost  happy  in  their  sense 
of  something  so  young  and  helpless  to  take  care  of. 
Pickering  understood,  nearly  as  well  as  Jack's 
mother,  that  Master  Jack,  as  he  had  remained  to 
her,  had  married  very  much  beneath  him;  but  at 
this  time  of  tragic  issues  and  primitive  values,  she, 
nearly  as  much  as  Jack's  mother,  felt  only  the 
claim,  the  pathos  of  youth  and  helplessness.  It  was 
as  if  they  had  a  singularly  appealing  case  of  a 
refugee  to  take  care  of;  social  and  even  moral 
appraisals  were  inapplicable  to  such  a  case,  and 
Mrs.  Bradley  felt  that  she  had  never  so  admired 
Pickering  as  when  seeing  that  for  her,  too,  they 
were  in  abeyance.  It  was  a  comfort  to  feel  so  fond 
of  Pickering  at  a  time  when  one  was  in  need  of  any 

[  77  1 


HEP  AT  I  CAS 

comfort  one  could  get;  and  to  feel  that,  creature  of 
codes  and  discriminations  as  she  was,  to  a  degree 
that  had  made  her  mistress  sometimes  think  of  her 
as  a  sort  of  Samurai  of  service,  a  function  rather 
than  a  person,  she  was  even  more  fundamentally  a 
kind  and  Christian  woman.  Between  them,  cook 
intelligently  sustaining  them  from  below  and  the 
housemaids  helpful  in  their  degree,  they  fed  and 
tended  and  nursed  Dollie,  and  by  that  eighth  day 
she  was  more  than  ready  to  get  up  and  go  down  and 
investigate  her  new  surroundings. 

She  sat  there  now,  in  the  pretty  tea-gown  her 
mother-in-law  had  bought  for  her,  leaning  back 
against  her  cushions,  one  arm  lying  along  the  back 
of  the  couch  and  one  foot  in  its  patent-leather  shoe, 
with  its  sparkling  buckle  and  alarming  heel, 
thrusting  forward  a  carefully  arched  instep.  The 
attitude  made  one  realize,  however  completely 
tenderer  preoccupations  held  the  foreground  of 
one's  consciousness,  how  often  and  successfully  she 
must  have  sat  to  theatrical  photographers.  Her 
way  of  smiling,  too,  very  softly,  yet  with  the  effect 
of  a  calculated  and  dazzling  display  of  pearly 
teeth,  was  impersonal,  and  directed,  as  it  were,  to 
the  public  via  the  camera  rather  than  to  any  indi 
vidual  interlocutor.  Mrs.  Bradley  even  imagined, 
unversed  as  she  was  in  the  methods  of  Dollie's 
world,  that  of  allurement  in  its  conscious  and 
determined  sense  she  was  almost  innocent.  She 
placed  herself,  she  adjusted  her  arm  and  her  foot, 
and  she  smiled  gently;  intention  hardly  Went 
further  than  that  wish  to  look  her  best. 

Pink  and  white  and  gold  as  she  was,  and  draped 
there  on  the  chesterfield  in  a  profusion  of  youth  and 
a  frivolity  that  was  yet  all  passivity,  she  made  her 

[78] 


HEP  ATI  CAS 

mother-in-law  think,  and  with  a  certain  sinking  of 
the  heart,  of  a  Dorothy  Perkins  rose,  a  flower  she 
had  never  cared  for;  and  Dollie  carried  on  the 
analogy  in  the  sense  she  gave  that  there  were  such 
myriads  more  just  like  her.  On  almost  every  page 
of  every  illustrated  weekly  paper,  one  saw  the 
ingenuous,  limpid  eyes,  the  display  of  eyelash,  the 
lips,  their  outline  emphasized  by  just  that  touch 
of  rouge,  those  copious  waves  of  hair.  Like  the 
Dorothy  Perkins  roses  on  their  pergolas,  so  these 
pretty  faces  seemed  —  looped,  draped,  festooned 
—  to  climb  over  all  the  available  spaces  of  the 
modern  press. 

But  this,  Mrs.  Bradley  told  herself,  was  to  see 
Dollie  with  a  dry,  hard  eye,  was  to  see  her  super 
ficially,  from  the  social  rather  than  from  the  human 
point  of  view.  Under  the  photographic  creature 
must  lie  the  young,  young  girl,  —  so  young,  so 
harmless  that  it  would  be  very  possible  to  mould 
her,  with  all  discretion,  all  tenderness,  into  some 
suitability  as  Jack's  wife.  Dollie,  from  the  moment 
that  she  had  found  her,  a  sodden,  battered  rose 
indeed,  in  the  London  lodging-house,  had  shown 
herself  grateful,  even  humble,  and  endlessly  acqui 
escent.  She  had  not  shown  herself  at  all  abashed 
or  apologetic,  and  that  had  been  a  relief;  had 
counted  for  her,  indeed,  in  her  mother-in-law's  eyes, 
as  a  sort  of  innocence,  a  sort  of  dignity.  But  if 
Dollie  were  contented  with  her  new  mother-in-law, 
and  very  grateful  to  her,  she  was  also  contented 
with  herself;  Mrs.  Bradley  had  been  aware  of  this 
at  once;  and  she  knew  now  that  if  she  were  being 
carefully  and  commendingly  watched  while  she 
poured  out  the  tea>  this  concentration  did  not 
imply  unqualified  approval.  Dollie  was  the  type  of 

[  791 


HEP  AT  I  CAS 

young  woman  to  whom  she  herself  stood  as  the 
type  of  the  " perfect  lady";  but  with  the  apprecia 
tion  went  the  proviso  of  the  sharp  little  London 
mind,  —  versed  in  the  whole  ritual  of  smartness  as 
it  displayed  itself  at  theatre  or  restaurant,  —  that 
she  was  a  rather  dowdy  one.  She  was  a  lady, 
perfect  but  not  smart,  while,  at  the  same  time,  the 
quality  of  her  defect  was,  she  imagined,  a  little 
bewildering  and  therefore  a  little  impressive. 
Actually  to  awe  Dollie  and  to  make  her  shy,  it 
would  be  necessary  to  be  smart;  but  it  was  far 
more  pleasant  and  perhaps  as  efficacious  merely 
to  impress  her,  and  it  was  as  well  that  Dollie  should 
be  impressed;  for  anything  in  the  nature  of  an 
advantage  that  she  could  recognize  would  make  it 
easier  to  direct,  protect,  and  mould  her. 

She  asked  her  a  good  many  leisurely  and  un 
stressed  questions  on  this  first  evening,  and  drew 
Dollie  to  ask  her  others  in  return;  and  she  saw  her 
self  stooping  thoughtfully  over  a  flourishing  young 
plant  that  yet  needed  transplanting,  softly  moving 
the  soil  about  its  roots,  softly  finding  out  if  there 
were  any  very  deep  tap-root  that  would  have  to  be 
dealt  with.  But  Dollie,  so  far  as  tastes  and  ideas 
went,  hardly  seemed  to  have  any  roots  at  all;  so 
few  that  it  was  a  question  if  any  change  of  soil 
could  affect  a  creature  so  shallow.  She  smiled,  she 
was  at  ease;  she  showed  her  complete  assurance 
that  a  young  lady  so  lavishly  endowed  with  all  the 
most  significant  gifts,  need  not  occupy  herself  with 
mental  adornments. 

"You're  a  great  one  for  books,  I  see,"  she  com 
mented,  looking  about  the  room;  "I  suppose  you 
do  a  great  deal  of  reading  down  here  to  keep  from 
feeling  too  dull";  and  she  added  that  she  herself, 

f  80  1 


HEP  AT  I  CAS 

f 

if  there  was  "nothing  doing,"  liked  a  good  novel, 
especially  if  she  had  a  box  of  sweets  to  eat  while  she 
read  it. 

"You  shall  have  a  box  of  sweets  to-morrow," 
Mrs.  Bradley  told  her,  "with  or  without  the  novel, 
as  you  like." 

And  Dollie  thanked  her,  watching  her  cut  the 
cake,  and,  as  the  rain  lashed  against  the  windows, 
remarking  on  the  bad  weather  and  cheerfully  hop 
ing  that  "poor  old  Jack"  was  n't  in  those  horrid 
trenches.  "I  think  war's  a  wicked  thing,  don't 
you,  Mrs.  Bradley?"  she  added. 

When  Dollie  talked  in  this  conventionally 
solicitous  tone  of  Jack,  her  mother-in-law  could 
but  wish  her  upstairs  again,  merely  young,  merely 
the  tired  and  battered  refugee.  She  had  not  much 
tenderness  for  Jack,  that  was  evident,  nor  much 
imaginativeness  in  regard  to  the  feelings  of  Jack's 
mother.  But  she  soon  passed  from  the  theme  of 
Jack  and  his  danger.  Her  tea  was  finished  and  she 
got  up  and  went  to  the  piano,  remarking  that  there 
was  one  thing  she  could  do.  "  Poor  mother  used  to 
always  say  I  was  made  of  music.  From  the  time  I 
was  a  mere  tot  I  could  pick  out  anything  on  the 
piano."  And  placing  herself,  pressing  down  the 
patent-leather  shoe  on  the  loud  pedal,  she  surged 
into  a  waltz  as  foolish  and  as  conventionally  allur 
ing  as  her  own  eyes.  Her  inaccuracy  was  equalled 
only  by  her  facility.  Smiling,  swaying  over  the 
keys  with  alternate  speed  and  languor,  she  ad 
dressed  her  audience  with  altogether  the  easy 
mastery  of  a  music-hall  artiste:  "It's  a  lovely 
thing  —  one  of  my  favourites.  I  '11  often  play,  Mrs. 
Bradley,  and  cheer  us  up.  There  is  nothing  like 
music  for  that,  is  there?  it  speaks  so  to  the  heart." 

[  81  ] 


HEPATICAS 

And,  whole-heartedly,  indeed,  she  accompanied 
the  melody  by  a  passionate  humming. 

The  piano  was  Jack's  and  it  was  poor  Jack  who 
was  made  of  music.  How  was  he  to  bear  it,  his 
mother  asked  herself,  as  she  sat  listening.  Dollie, 
after  that  initiation,  spent  many  hours  at  the 
piano  every  day,  —  so  many  and  such  noisy  hours, 
that  her  mother-in-law,  unnoticed,  could  shut  her 
self  in  the  little  morning-room  that  overlooked  the 
brick  wall  at  the  front  of  the  house  and  had  the 
morning  sun. 

It  was  difficult  to  devise  other  occupations  for 
Dollie.  She  earnestly  disclaimed  any  wish  to  have 
proper  music  lessons,  and  when  her  mother-in-law, 
patiently  persistent,  arranged  for  a  skilful  mistress 
to  come  down  twice  a  week  from  London,  Dollie 
showed  such  apathy  and  dulness  that  any  hope  of 
developing  such  musical  ability  as  she  possessed 
had  to  be  abandoned.  She  did  not  like  walking, 
and  the  sober  pageant  of  the  winter  days  was  a 
blank  book  to  her.  Sewing,  she  said,  had  always 
given  her  frightful  fidgets;  and  it  was  with  the 
strangest  sense  of  a  privilege,  a  joy,  unhoped-for 
and  now  thrust  upon  her,  that  Mrs.  Bradley  sat 
alone  working  at  the  little  garments  that  meant  all 
her  future  and  all  Jack's.  The  baby  seemed  al 
ready  more  hers  than  Dollie's. 

Sometimes,  on  a  warm  afternoon,  Dollie,  wrap 
ped  in  her  fur  cloak,  would  emerge  for  a  little  while 
and  watch  her  mother-in-law  at  work  in  her  bor 
ders.  The  sight  amused  and  surprised  but  hardly 
interested  her,  and  she  soon  went  tottering  back 
to  the  house  on  the  preposterous  heels  that  Mrs. 
Bradley  had,  as  yet,  found  no  means  of  tactfully 
banishing.  And  sometimes,  when  the  piano  again 


HEP  AT  I  CAS 

resounded,  Mrs.  Bradley  would  leave  her  borders 
and  retreat  to  the  hazel-copse,  where,  as  she  sat  on 
the  stone  bench,  she  could  hear,  through  the  soft 
sound  of  the  running  water,  hardly  more  than  the 
distant  beat  and  hum  of  Dollie's  waltzes ;  and  where, 
with  more  and  more  the  sense  of  escape  and  safety, 
she  could  find  a  refuge  from  the  sight  and  sound 
and  scent  of  Dollie,  —  the  thick,  sweet,  penetrat 
ing  scent  that  was  always  to  be  indelibly  associ 
ated  in  her  mind  with  this  winter  of  foreboding, 
of  hope,  and  of  growing  hopelessness. 

In  her  letters  to  Jack,  she  found  herself,  invol 
untarily  at  first,  and  then  deliberately,  altering, 
suppressing,  even  falsifying.  While  Dollie  had 
been  in  bed,  when  so  much  hope  had  been  possible 
of  a  creature  so  unrevealed,  she  had  written  very 
tenderly,  and  she  continued,  now,  to  write  ten 
derly,  and  it  was  not  false  to  do  that;  she  could 
feel  no  hardness  or  antagonism  against  poor  Dollie. 
But  she  continued  to  write  hopefully,  as  every  day 
hope  grew  less. 

Jack,  himself,  did  not  say  much  of  Dollie,  though 
there  was  always  the  affectionate  message  and  the 
affectionate  inquiry.  But  what  was  difficult  to  deal 
with  were  the  hints  of  his  anxiety  and  fear  that 
stole  among  the  terse,  cheerful  descriptions  of  his 
precarious  days.  What  was  she  doing  with  herself? 
How  were  she  and  Dollie  getting  on?  Did  Dollie 
care  about  any  of  the  things  she  cared  about? 

She  told  him  that  they  got  on  excellently  well, 
that  Dollie  spent  a  good  deal  of  time  at  the  piano, 
and  that  when  they  went  out  to  tea  people  were 
perfectly  nice  and  understanding.  She  knew,  in 
deed,  that  she  could  depend  on  her  friends  to  be 
that.  They  accepted  Dollie  on  the  terms  she  asked 

[83] 


HEPATICAS 

?** 

for  her.  From  friends  so  near  as  Mrs.  Crawley  and 
Lady  Wrexham  she  had  not  concealed  the  fact  that 
Dollie  was  a  misfortune;  but  if  others  thought  so 
they  were  not  to  show  it.  She  still  hoped,  by  de 
grees,  to  make  Dollie  a  figure  easier  to  deal  with  at 
such  neighbourly  gatherings.  She  had  abandoned 
any  hope  that  Dollie  would  grow;  anything  so 
feeble  and  so  foolish  could  not  grow;  there  was  no 
other  girl  under  the  little  dancer;  she  was  simply  no 
more  and  no  less  than  she  showed  herself  to  be; 
but,  at  this  later  stage  of  their  relationship,  Mrs. 
Bradley  essayed,  now  and  then,  a  deliberate  if 
kindly  severity,  —  as  to  heels,  as  to  scents,  as  to 
touches  of  rouge. 

"Oh,  but  I'm  as  careful,  just  as  careful,  Mrs. 
Bradley!"  Dollie  protested.  "I  can't  walk  in 
lower  heels.  They  hurt  my  instep.  I  Ve  a  very  high 
instep  and  it  needs  support."  She  was  genuinely 
amazed  that  any  one  could  dislike  her  scent  and 
that  any  one  could  think  the  rouge  unbecoming. 
She  seemed  to  acquiesce,  but  the  acquiescence  was 
followed  by  moods  of  mournfulness  and  even  by 
tears.  There  was  no  capacity  in  her  for  temper  or 
rebellion,  and  she  was  all  unconscious  of  giving  a 
warning  as  she  sobbed,  "It's  nothing — really 
nothing,  Mrs.  Bradley.  I'm  sure  you  mean  to  be 
kind.  Only  —  it's  rather  quiet  and  lonely  here. 
I  Ve  always  been  used  to  so  many  people,  —  to 
having  everything  so  bright  and  jolly." 

She  was  not  rapacious ;  she  was  not  dissolute ;  she 
could  be  kept  respectable  and  even  contented  if  she 
were  not  made  too  aware  of  the  contrast  between 
her  past  existence  and  her  present  lot.  With  an  air 
only  of  pensive  pride  she  would  sometimes  point 
out  to  Mrs.  Bradley,  in  the  pages  of  those  same 


HEP  AT  I  CAS 

illustrated  weeklies  with  which  her  mother-in-law 
associated  her,  the  face  of  some  former  companion. 
One  of  these  young  ladies  had  recently  married  the 
son  of  a  peer.  "She  is  in  luck,  Floss,"  said  Dollie. 
"We  always  thought  it  would  come  to  that.  He's 
been  gone  on  her  for  ages,  but  his  people  were 
horrid." 

Mrs.  Bradley  felt  that,  at  all  events,  Dollie  had 
no  ground  for  thinking  her  "horrid";  yet  she 
imagined  that  there  lay  drowsing  at  the  back  of 
her  mind  a  plaintive  little  sense  of  being  caught  and 
imprisoned.  Floss  had  stepped,  triumphant,  from 
the  footlights  to  the  registrar's  office,  and  appar 
ently  had  succeeded  in  uniting  the  radiance  of  her 
past  and  present  status.  No,  Dollie  could  be  kept 
respectable  and  contented  only  if  the  pressure  were 
of  the  lightest.  She  could  not  change,  she  could 
only  shift;  and  although  Mrs.  Bradley  felt  that 
for  herself,  her  life  behind  her,  her  story  told,  she 
could  manage  to  put  up  with  a  merely  shifted 
Dollie,  she  could  not  see  how  Jack  was  to  manage 
it.  What  was  Jack  to  do  with  her?  was  the  thought 
that  pressed  with  a  growing  weight  on  her  heart. 
She  could  never  be  of  Jack's  life;  yet  here  she  was, 
in  it,  planted  there  by  his  own  generous  yet  inevita 
ble  act,  and  by  hers,  —  in  its  very  centre,  and  not 
to  be  evaded  or  forgotten. 

And  the  contrast  between  what  Jack's  life  might 
have  been  and  what  it  now  must  be  was  made  more 
poignantly  apparent  to  her  when  Frances  Graham 
came  down  to  stay  from  a  Saturday  to  Monday; 
Frances  in  her  black,  tired  and  thin  from  Red- 
Cross  work  in  London;  bereaved  in  more,  her  old 
friend  knew,  than  dear  Toppie's  death;  yet  with 
her  leisurely,  unstressed  cheerfulness  almost  un- 

[  85  1 


HEP  AT  I  CAS 

altered,  the  lightness  that  went  with  so  much  ten 
derness,  the  drollery  that  went  with  so  much  depth. 
Dearest,  most  charming  of  girls  —  but  for  Jack's 
wretched  stumble  into  "fairyland"  last  summer, 
destined  obviously  to  be  his  wife,  —  could  any 
presence  have  shown  more  disastrously,  in  its  con 
trast  with  poor  Dollie,  how  Jack  had  done  for  him 
self?  She  watched  the  two  together  that  evening, 
Frances  with  her  thick  crinkled  hair  and  clearly 
curved  brow  and  her  merry,  steady  eyes,  leaning, 
elbow  on  knee,  to  talk  and  listen  to  Dollie;  and 
Dollie,  poor  Dollie,  flushed,  touched  with  an  un 
becoming  sulkiness,  aware,  swiftly  and  unerringly, 
of  a  rival  type.  Frances  was  of  the  type  that  young 
men  married  when  they  did  not  "do  for  them 
selves."  There  was  now  no  gulf  of  age  or  habit  to 
veil  from  Dollie  her  disadvantage.  She  answered 
shortly,  with  now  and  then  a  dry,  ironic  little 
laugh;  and,  getting  up  at  last,  she  went  to  the 
piano  and  loudly  played. 

"He  could  n't  have  done  differently.  It  was  the 
only  thing  he  could  do,"  Frances  said  that  night 
before  her  bedroom  fire.  She  did  not  hide  her 
recognition  of  Jack's  plight,  but  she  was  staunch. 

"I  would  n't  have  had  him  do  differently.  But 
it  will  ruin  his  life,"  said  the  mother.  "If  he  comes 
back  it  will  ruin  his  life." 

"No,  no,"  said  Frances,  looking  at  the  flames. 
"Why  should  it?  A  man  does  n't  depend  on  his 
marriage  like  that.  He  has  his  career." 

"Yes.  He  has  his  career.  A  career  is  n't  a  life." 

"Is  n't  it?"  The  girl  gazed  down.  "But  it's  what 
so  many  people  have  to  put  up  with.  And  so  many 
have  n't  even  a  career."  Something  came  into  her 
voice  and  she  turned  from  it  quickly.  "He's 

[  86] 


HEP  AT  1C  AS 

crippled,  in  a  sense,  of  course.  But  you  are  here. 
He  will  have  you  to  come  back  to  always." 

"I  shall  soon  be  old,  dear,  and  she  will  always  be 
here.  That's  inevitable.  Some  day  I  shall  have  to 
leave  her  to  Jack  to  bear  with  alone." 

"She  may  become  more  of  a  companion." 

"No;  no,  she  won't."  The  bitterness  of  the 
mother's  heart  expressed  itself  in  the  dry,  light 
utterance.  It  was  a  comfort  to  express  bitterness, 
for  once,  to  somebody. 

"She  is  a  harmless  little  thing,"  Frances  offered 
after  a  moment. 

"Harmless?"  Mrs.  Bradley  turned  it  over  drily 
and  lightly.  "  I  can't  feel  her  that.  I  feel  her  blame 
less  if  you  like.  And  it  will  be  easy  to  keep  her 
contented.  That  is  really  the  best  that  one  can  say 
of  poor  Dollie.  And  then  there  will  be  the  child. 
I  am  pinning  all  my  hopes  to  the  child,  Frances." 

Frances  understood  that. 

Dollie,  as  the  winter  wore  on,  kept  remarkably 
well.  She  had  felt  it  the  proper  thing  to  allude  to 
Jack  and  his  danger;  and  so,  now,  she  more  and 
more  frequently  felt  it  the  proper  thing  to  allude, 
humorously  if  with  a  touch  of  melancholy,  to 
"baby."  Her  main  interest  in  baby,  Mrs.  Bradley 
felt,  was  an  alarmed  one.  She  was  a  good  deal 
frightened,  poor  little  soul,  and  in  need  of  constant 
reassurances;  and  it  was  when  one  need  only  pet 
and  pity  Dollie  that  she  was  easier  to  deal  with. 
Mrs.  Bradley  tried  to  interest  her  in  plans  for  the 
baby;  what  it  should  be  named,  and  how  its  hair 
should  be  done  if  it  were  a  little  girl,  —  for  only 
on  this  assumption  could  Dollie's  interest  be  at 
all  vividly  roused;  and  Mrs.  Bradley  more  than 
ever  hoped  for  a  boy  when  she  found  Dollie's 


HEPATICAS 

idle  yet  stubborn  thoughts  fixed  on  the  name  of 
Gloria. 

She  was  able  to  evade  discussion  of  this  point, 
and  when  the  baby  came,  fortunately  and  robustly, 
into  the  world  on  a  fine  March  morning,  she  could 
feel  it  as  a  minor  but  very  real  cause  for  thanks 
giving  that  Dollie  need  now  never  know  what  she 
thought  of  Gloria  as  a  name.  The  baby  was  a  boy, 
and  now  that  he  was  here  Dollie  seemed  as  well 
pleased  that  he  should  be  a  commonplace  Jack, 
and  that  there  should  be  no  question  of  tying  his 
hair  with  cockades  of  ribbon  over  each  ear.  Smiling 
and  rosy  and  languid,  she  lay  in  her  charming  room, 
not  at  all  more  maternal  —  though  she  showed  a 
bland  satisfaction  in  her  child  and  noted  that  his 
eyes  were  just  like  Jack's  —  yet  subtly  more 
wifely.  Baby,  she  no  doubt  felt,  with  the  dim 
instinct  that  did  duty  for  thought  with  her,  placed 
and  rooted  her  and  gave  her  final  rights.  She  re 
ferred  now  to  Jack  with  the  pensive  but  open 
affection  of  their  shared  complacency,  and  made 
her  mother-in-law  think,  as  she  lay  there,  of  a  soft 
and  sleepy  and  tenacious  creeper,  fixing  tentacle 
after  tentacle  in  the  walls  of  Jack's  house  of  life. 

If  only  one  could  feel  that  she  had  furnished  it 
with  a  treasure!  Gravely,  with  a  sad  fondness,  the 
grandmother  studied  the  little  face,  so  unfamiliar, 
for  signs  of  Jack.  She  was  a  helplessly  clear-sighted 
woman,  and  remembrance  was  poignantly  vivid  in 
her  of  Jack's  face  at  a  week  old.  Already  she  loved 
the  baby  since  its  eyes,  indubitably,  were  his;  but 
she  could  find  no  other  trace  of  him.  It  was  not  a 
Bradley  baby;  and  in  the  dreamy,  foreboding 
flickers  of  individuality  that  pass  uncannily  across 
an  infant's  features,  her  melancholy  and  steady 


HEPATICAS 

discernment  could  see  only  the  Watson  ancestry. 

She  was  to  do  all  she  could  for  the  baby;  to  save 
him,  so  far  as  might  be,  from  his  Watson  ancestry 
and  to  keep  him,  so  far  as  might  be,  Jack's  and 
hers.  That  was  to  be  her  task.  But  with  all  the 
moulding  that  could,  mercifully,  be  applied  from 
the  very  beginning,  she  could  not  bring  herself  to 
believe  that  this  was  ever  to  be  a  very  significant 
human  being. 

She  sent  Jack  his  wire:  "A  son.  Dollie  doing 
splendidly."  And  she  had  his  answer:  "Best 
thanks.  Love  to  Dollie."  It  was  curious,  indeed, 
this  strange  new  fact  they  had  now,  always,  to 
deal  with;  this  light  little  "Dollie"  that  must  be 
passed  between  them.  The  baby  might  have  made 
Jack  happy,  but  it  had  not  solved  the  problem  of 
his  future. 

Ill 

A  WEEK  later  the  telegram  was  brought  to  her 
telling  her  that  he  had  been  killed  in  action. 

It  was  a  beautiful  spring  day,  just  such  a  day  as 
that  on  which  she  and  Jack  had  first  seen  Dorring- 
ton,  and  she  had  been  working  in  the  garden. 
When  she  had  read,  she  turned  and  walked  down 
the  path  that  led  to  the  hazel-copse.  She  hardly 
knew  what  had  happened  to  her;  there  was  only  an 
instinct  for  flight,  concealment,  secrecy;  but,  as 
she  walked,  there  rose  in  her,  without  sound,  as  if 
in  a  nightmare,  the  terrible  cry  of  her  loneliness. 
The  dark  wet  earth  that  covered  him  seemed 
heaped  upon  her  heart. 

The  hazel-copse  was  tasselled  thickly  with 
golden-green,  and  as  she  entered  it  she  saw  that 


HEP  ATI  CAS 

the  hepaticas  were  in  flower.  They  seemed  to  shine 
with  their  own  celestial  whiteness,  set  in  their 
melancholy  green  among  the  fallen  leaves.  She  had 
never  seen  them  look  so  beautiful. 

She  followed  the  path,  looking  down  at  them, 
and  she  seemed  to  feel  Jack's  little  hand  in  hers  and 
to  see,  at  her  side,  his  nut-brown  head.  It  had  been 
on  just  such  a  morning.  She  came  to  the  stone 
bench;  but  the  impulse  that  had  led  her  here  was 
altered.  She  did  not  sink  down  and  cover  her  face, 
but  stood  looking  around  her  at  the  flowers,  the 
telegram  still  open  in  her  hand;  and  slowly,  with 
stealing  calm,  the  sense  of  sanctuary  fell  about  her. 

She  had  lost  him,  and  with  him  went  all  her  life. 
He  was  dead,  his  youth  and  strength  and  beauty. 
Yet  what  was  this  strange  up-welling  of  relief,  deep, 
deep  relief,  for  Jack;  this  gladness,  poignant  and 
celestial,  like  that  of  the  hepaticas?  He  was  dead 
and  the  dark  earth  covered  him;  yet  he  was  here, 
with  her,  safe  in  his  youth  and  strength  and  beauty 
forever.  He  had  died  the  glorious  death,  and  no 
future,  tangled,  perplexed,  fretful  with  its  foolish 
burden,  lay  before  him.  There  was  no  loss  for  Jack ; 
no  fading,  no  waste.  The  burden  was  for  her  and 
he  was  free. 

Later  when  pain  should  have  dissolved  thought 
her  agony  would  come  to  her  unalleviated;  but 
this  hour  was  hers  and  his.  She  heard  the  river 
and  the  soft  whisperings  of  spring.  A  bird  dropped 
lightly  unafraid  from  branch  to  branch  of  a  tree 
near  by.  From  the  woods  came  the  rapid  insist 
ent  tapping  of  a  woodpecker;  and  as  in  so  many 
springs  she  seemed  to  hear  Jack  say,  "Hark,  mum 
my,"  and  his  little  hand  was  always  held  in  hers. 
And  everywhere  telling  of  irreparable  loss,  of  a 

[90] 


HEP  AT  I  CAS 

possession  unalterable,  the  tragic,  the  celestial  he- 
paticas. 

She  sat  down  on  the  stone  bench  now  and  closed 
her  eyes  for  a  little  while  so  holding  them  more 
closely  —  Jack  and  the  hepaticas  —  together. 


VAFFOTHLS 


I 

CHOUGH  he  knew  that  he 
was  going  to  die,  Marmaduke 
Follett  as  he  lay  in  the  hospi 
tal  on  the  French  coast  had 
never  in  his  life  been  so  happy. 
Until  these  last  days  he  had 
not  been  able  to  feel  it  in  its 
completeness.  Of  the  great 
engagement  where  he  had  fallen  he  remembered 
only  the  overwhelming  uproar,  the  blood  and  mud; 
and  after  that,  torments,  apathies,  dim  awakenings 
to  the  smell  of  ether  and  relapses  to  acquiescent 
sleep.  Now  the  last  operation  had  failed  —  or 
rather,  he  had  failed  to  recover  from  it  —  and  there 
was  no  more  hope  for  him;  but  he  hardly  suffered 
and  his  thoughts  were  emerging  into  a  world  of 
cleanliness,  kindness,  and  repose. 

The  hospital  before  the  war  had  been  a  big  hotel, 
and  his  was  one  of  the  bedrooms  on  the  second 
floor,  its  windows  crossed  by  two  broad  blue  bands 
of  sea  and  sky.  As  an  officer  he  had  a  room  to  him 
self.  The  men  were  in  the  wards  downstairs. 

One  of  his  nurses  —  both  were  pleasant  girls  but 
this  was  the  one  who  with  a  wing  of  black  hair  curv 
ing  under  her  cap  reminded  him  of  his  cousin 
Victoria  —  had  put  a  glass  of  daffodils  beside  his 

[92] 


DAFFODILS 

bed,  not  garden  daffodils,  but  the  wild  ones  that 
grow  in  woods;  and  if  she  made  him  think  of  Vic 
toria  how  much  more  they  made  him  think  of  the 
woods  in  spring  at  Channerley! 

He  was  dying  after  a  gallant  deed.  It  was  a 
fitting  death  for  a  Follett  and  so  little  in  his  life  had 
been  at  all  fitted  to  that  initial  privilege:  it  was 
only  in  the  manner  of  his  death  that  his  life  matched 
at  all  those  thoughts  of  Victoria  and  Channerley. 

He  did  not  remember  much  of  the  manner;  it 
still  remained  cloaked  in  the  overwhelming  up 
roar;  but  as  he  lay  there  he  seemed  to  read  in  the 
columns  of  the  London  papers  what  all  the  Folletts 
were  so  soon  to  read  —  because  of  him:  — 

"His  Majesty  the  King  has  been  graciously 
pleased  to  award  the  Victoria  Cross  to  the  under 
mentioned  officers,  non-commissioned  officers  and 
men:  — 

"Sec.  Lt.  Marmaduke  Everard  Follett.  For 
most  conspicuous  bravery. 

"He  was  directed  with  50  men  to  drive  the  enemy 
from  their  trench  and  under  intense  shell-  and  ma 
chine-gun  fire  he  personally  led  three  separate 
parties  of  bombers  against  a  captured  325  yards  of 
trench;  attacking  the  machine  gun,  shooting  the 
firer  with  his  revolver,  and  destroying  gun  and 
personnel  with  bombs.  This  very  brave  act  saved 
many  lives  and  ensured  the  success  of  the  attack. 
In  carrying  one  of  his  men  back  to  safety  Sec.  Lt. 
Follett  was  mortally  wounded." 

He  felt  himself  smile,  as  he  soberly  spaced  it  out, 
io  remember  that  the  youths  at  the  office  used  to 
call  him  Marmalade.  It  was  curious  that  he  most 
felt  his  present  and  his  present  transfigured  self, 
when  he  thought  of  CauldwelPs  office,  where  so 

[93  1 


DAFFODILS 

many  years  of  his  past  had  been  spent.  When  he 
thought  of  that,  of  the  jocund  youths,  of  the  weary 
hours  and  wasted  years,  it  was  to  feel  himself 
transfigured;  when  he  thought  of  the  Folletts  and 
of  Channerley,  to  feel  that  he  matched  them;  to 
feel  at  last  as  if  he  had  come  home.  What  to  the 
grimy,  everyday  world  counted  as  transfiguration, 
counted  as  the  normal,  the  expected,  to  the  world 
of  Channerley. 

He  wondered,  lying  there  and  looking  out  past 
the  daffodils,  where  Victoria  was;  he  had  heard 
that  she  was  nursing,  too,  somewhere  in  France; 
and  again,  as  he  had  smiled  over  the  contrast  of 
"Sec.  Lt.  Marmaduke  Everard  Follett"  and  the 
"Marmalade"  of  CauldwelPs  office,  he  smiled  in 
thinking  of  the  difference  between  Victoria  and  the 
nice  young  nurse  who,  for  all  her  resembling  curve 
of  hair,  was  also  second-rate.  It  would  have  been 
very  wonderful  to  have  been  nursed  by  Victoria, 
and  yet  his  thought  turned  from  that.  There  had 
never  been  any  sweetness,  never  even  any  kind 
ness  for  him,  in  Victoria's  clear  young  gaze;  when 
it  came  to  nursing,  he  could  imagine  her  being  kind 
to  a  Tommy,  but  not  to  him,  the  dull,  submerged 
cousin;  and  the  nice  though  second-rate  nurse  was 
very  kind.  He  would  rather  die  under  her  eyes 
than  under  Victoria's. 

And  he  would  rather  think  of  Victoria  as  he  had 
last  seen  her  at  the  big  London  dance  to  which, 
most  unexpectedly,  he  had  found  himself  asked 
last  spring  —  the  spring  before  the  war.  He  had 
decided,  as  with  nervous  fingers  he  tied  his  white 
cravat,  —  how  rarely  disturbed  had  been  that  neat 
sheaf  lying  in  his  upper  drawer!  —  that  he  must 
have  been  confused  with  some  other  Follett,  for  he 

[94] 


DAFFODILS 

was  so  seldom  asked  anywhere,  where  he  would  be 
likely  to  meet  Victoria.  However,  it  was  a  delight 
to  see  her  in  her  snowy  dress,  her  beautiful  hair 
bound  with  silver,  and  to  feel,  as  he  watched  her 
dancing,  that  she  belonged,  in  a  sense,  to  him;  for 
he,  too,  was  a  Follett. 

How  much  more  did  she  belong  to  him  now! 
And  not  only  Victoria,  but  all  of  them,  these  Fol- 
letts  of  his  and  the  Folletts  of  past  generations; 
and  Channerley,  centre  of  all  his  aching,  wistful 
memories.  It  had  been  for  him,  always,  part  of  the 
very  structure  of  his  nature,  that  beautiful  old 
house  where  he  had  spent  his  boyhood.  Perhaps  it 
was  because  he  had  been  turned  out  of  the  nest 
so  early  that  he  never  ceased  to  miss  it.  His 
thought,  like  a  maimed  fledgling,  had  fluttered 
round  and  round  it,  longing,  exiled,  helpless. 

If,  now,  he  could  have  survived,  his  eldest 
brother,  he  felt  sure,  must  have  asked  him  oftener 
to  stay  at  Channerley.  It  still  gave  him  a  pang,  or, 
rather,  the  memory  of  many  pangs,  to  recall  that 
Robert  had  not  asked  him  for  two  years,  and  had 
seemed  to  forget  all  about  him  after  that.  They 
had  all  seemed  to  forget  about  him,  —  that  was 
the  trouble  of  it,  —  and  almost  from  the  very 
beginning:  Robert,  who  had  Channerley;  Austin, 
who  had  gone  into  the  army  and  was  now  in 
Mesopotamia;  Griselda,  married  so  splendidly  up 
in  her  northern  estate;  and  Amy,  the  artistic  bache 
lor-girl  of  the  family,  whom  he  associated  with 
irony  and  cigarette-smoke  and  prolonged  absences 
in  Paris.  Even  cheerful  Sylvia,  of  South  Kensing 
ton,  with  her  many  babies  and  K.C.  husband, 
whom  he  always  thought  of,  for  all  her  well-being, 
as  very  nearly  as  submerged  as  himself,  —  even 

[95 1 


DAFFODILS 

Sylvia  saw  little  of  him  and  asked  him  only  to 
family  dinners,  —  Mr.  Shillington's  family,  not 
hers/; —  at  depressingly  punctual  intervals. 

But  Sylvia,  the  one  nearest  him  in  years,  was  the 
one  who  had  forgotten  least,  and  she  had,  after  her 
fashion,  done  her  best  for  him.  Confused  at  study, 
clumsy  at  games,  shy  and  tongue-tied,  he  had  not 
in  any  way  distinguished  himself  at  a  rather  second- 
rate  public  school;  and  to  distinguish  himself  had 
been  the  only  hope  for  him.  The  Folletts  had  never 
had  any  money  to  spare,  and  Eton  and  Oxford  for 
Robert  and  Sandhurst  for  Austin  fulfilled  a  tradi 
tion  that  became  detached  and  terse  where  younger 
sons  who  could  not  distinguish  themselves  were 
concerned.  Still,  he  had  always  felt  that,  had  his 
father  lived,  something  better  would  have  been 
found  for  him  than  to  be  bundled,  through  the 
instrumentality  of  Mr.  Shillington,  into  a  solici 
tor's  office.  There  he  had  been  bundled,  and  there 
he  had  stuck  for  all  these  years,  as  clumsy,  as  con 
fused  as  ever;  a  pallid,  insignificant  little  fellow  (oh, 
he  had  no  illusions  about  himself!)  with  the  yellow 
hair  and  small  yellow  moustache  which,  together 
with  his  name,  had  earned  for  him  his  sobriquet. 

They  had  not  disliked  him,  those  direfully 
facetious  companions  of  his.  Noblesse  oblige  was 
an  integral  part  of  his  conception  of  himself,  how 
ever  little  they  might  be  aware  of  his  unvarying 
courtesy  towards  them  as  its  exercise.  He  suspected 
that  they  thought  of  him  as  merely  inoffensive 
and  rather  piteous;  but  shyness  might  give  that 
impression;  they  could  not  guess  at  the  quiet 
aversion  that  it  covered.  He  was  aware  some 
times,  suddenly,  that  in  the  aloofness  and  contem 
plative  disdain  of  his  pale  sidelong  glance  at  them, 

[96] 


DAFFODILS 

he  most  felt  himself  a  Follett.  If  his  mind,  for  most 
practical  purposes,  was  slow  and  clumsy,  it  was 
sharp  and  swift  in  its  perceptions.  He  judged  the 
young  men  in  Cauldwell's  office  as  a  Follett  must 
judge  them.  In  the  accurate  applying  of  that 
standard  he  was  as  instinctively  gifted  as  any  of 
his  race;  and  if  he  knew,  from  his  first  look  at  her, 
that  the  nice  young  nurse  was  second-rate,  how 
coldly  and  calmly,  all  these  years,  he  had  known 
that  the  young  men  who  called  him  Marmalade 
were  third-rate.  And  yet  they  none  of  them  dis 
liked  him,  and  he  wondered  whether  it  was  because, 
when  he  most  felt  disdain,  he  most  looked  merely 
timid,  or  because  they  recognized  in  him,  all  dimly 
as  it  might  be,  the  first-rateness  that  was  his  in 
herently  and  inalienably. 

Just  as  the  third-rate  young  men  might  recognize 
the  first-rate  but  dimly,  he  was  aware  that  to  the 
world  the  Folletts,  too,  were  not  important.  It  was 
not  one  of  the  names,  in  spite  of  centuries  of  local 
lustre,  to  conjure  with;  and  he  liked  it  all  the  better 
because  of  that.  They  had  never,  it  was  true,  dis 
tinguished  themselves;  but  they  were  people  of 
distinction,  and  that  was,  to  his  quiet,  reflective, 
savouring,  an  even  higher  state.  He  sometimes 
wondered  if,  in  any  of  them,  the  centring  of  family 
consciousness  was  as  intense  as  in  himself.  If  they 
were  aloof  about  third-rate  people,  it  was  not  be 
cause  they  were  really  very  conscious  about  them 
selves.  They  took  themselves  for  granted,  as  they 
took  Channerley  and  the  family  history;  and  only 
Amy  was  aware  that  some  of  the  family  portraits 
were  good. 

The  history  —  it  was  not  of  course  accurate  to 
call  it  that,  yet  it  seemed  more  spacious  and  signifi- 

1 97] 


DAFFODILS 

cant  than  mere  annals  —  pored  over  during  long 
evenings,  in  faded  parchments,  deeds,  and  letters, 
was  known  in  every  least  detail  to  him.  How  the 
Folletts  had  begun,  very  soberly  but  very  deco 
rously,  in  the  fifteenth  century,  and  how  they  had 
gone  on:  rooting  more  deeply  into  their  pleasant 
woodlands  and  meadows;  flowering,  down  the  cen 
turies,  now  in  a  type  of  grace  —  that  charming 
Antonia  who  had  married  so  well  at  James  the 
First's  court;  and  of  gallantry  —  a  Follett  had 
fallen  at  Naseby,  and  a  Follett  had  fought  at 
Waterloo;  or  of  good-humoured  efficiency,  as  in 
the  eighteenth-century  judge  and  the  nineteenth- 
century  bishop.  And  he,  who  was  neither  graceful 
nor  gallant  nor  good-humoured  (sour  and  sad  he  felt 
himself),  never  could  resist  the  warming,  revivifying 
influence  of  these  recognitions,  stretching  himself, 
sighing,  smiling  happily  before  his  Bloomsbury  fire 
on  a  winter's  evening,  as  he  laid  down  the  thick  pile 
of  yellowed  manuscripts  to  think  it  all  over  and 
feel  himself,  in  spite  of  everything,  a  link  with  it  all. 

Robert  had  always  been  very  decent  about  let 
ting  him  have  and  keep  the  documents  for  as  long 
as  he  liked. 

It  was  strange  to  think  that  he  was  never  to  see 
his  Bloomsbury  lodgings  again,  and  stranger, 
really,  that  a  certain  tinge  of  regret  was  in  the 
thought;  for  how,  for  years,  he  had  hated  them, 
place  of  exile,  of  relegation,  as  he  had  always  felt 
them!  Yet  he  had  come  to  be  fond  of  his  little 
sitting-room,  just  because,  to  his  eye,  with  its 
mingled  comfort  and  austerity,  it  was  so  signifi 
cant  of  exile.  If  a  Follett  could  n't  have  what  he 
wanted,  that  was  all  he  would  have  —  his  rack  of 
pipes,  his  shelves  of  books,  his  little  collection  of 

[98] 


DAFFODILS 

mostly  marginless  mezzotints  ranged  along  the 
dark,  green  walls.  The  room  was  a  refuge  and  did 
not  pretend  to  be  an  achievement,  and  in  that  very 
fact  might,  to  an  eye  as  sharp  as  his  for  such  signifi 
cance,  suggest  the  tastes  that  it  relinquished.  He 
had  indeed  all  the  tastes  and  none  of  the  satisfac 
tions  of  Channerley. 

There  it  was;  he  had  come  back  to  it  again,  as, 
indeed,  he  had,  in  spirit,  never  left  it  —  never  for  a 
moment.  He  felt  himself,  lying  there  in  the  hospital 
on  the  French  coast,  with  the  soft  spring  sea  lap 
ping  upon  the  beach  under  his  window  —  he  felt 
himself  drop,  drop,  softly,  sweetly,  deeply,  back  to 
his  childhood.  From  his  high  nursery-window  he 
saw  the  dewy  tree-tops,  —  the  old  hawthorn  that 
grew  so  near  the  house,  and  the  old  mulberry,  — 
and  the  rooks  wheeling  on  a  spring  sky  so  many 
years  ago.  The  dogs,  at  that  early  hour,  just  re 
leased,  might  be  racing  over  the  lawns:  idle,  jovial 
Peter,  the  spaniel,  and  Jack,  the  plucky,  hot-tem 
pered  little  Dandy-Dinmont. 

Below  the  lawns  were  the  high  grey  garden 
walls,  and  above,  rising  a  little  from  the  flagged 
rose-garden,  were  the  woods  where  the  daffodils 
grew,  daffodils  like  those  beside  him  now,  tall  and 
small,  their  pale,  bright  pennons  set  among  war 
rior  spears  of  green.  Little  bands  of  them  ran  out 
upon  the  lawn  from  under  the  great  trees,  and  one 
saw  their  gold  glimmering  far,  far  along  the  wood 
lands.  Oh,  the  beauty  of  it,  and  the  stillness;  the 
age  and  youth;  the  smile  and  the  security!  How 
he  had  always  loved  it,  shambling  about  the  woods 
and  gardens;  creeping  rather  —  he  always  saw 
himself  as  creeping  somehow  —  about  the  dear, 
gay,  faded  house!  Always  such  an  awkward,  in- 

[99] 


DAFFODILS 

significant  little  boy;  even  his  dear  old  Nanna  had 
felt  dissatisfied  with  his  appearance,  and  he  had 
always  known  it,  when  she  sent  him  down  with 
the  others  to  the  drawing-room;  and  his  mother, 
she  had  made  it  very  apparent,  had  found  him  only 
that. 

He  shrank  from  the  thought  of  his  mother;  per 
haps  it  was  because  of  her,  of  her  vexed  and  averted 
eyes,  her  silken  rustle  of  indifference  as  she  passed 
him  by,  that  he  saw  himself  as  creeping  anywhere 
where  she  might  come.  He  only  remembered  her 
in  glimpses:  languidly  and  ironically  smiling  at  her 
tea-table  (Amy  had  her  smile),  the  artificial  tone 
of  her  voice  had  even  then  struck  his  boyish  ear; 
reading  on  a  summer  afternoon,  with  bored  brows 
and  dissatisfied  lips,  as  she  lay  on  a  garden  chair 
in  the  shade  of  the  mulberry  tree;  querulously  ar 
guing  with  his  father,  who,  good-humoured  and 
very  indifferent,  strolled  about  the  hall  in  his  pink 
coat  on  a  winter  morning,  waiting  for  the  horses  to 
be  brought  round;  his  mother's  yellow  braids 
shining  under  her  neatly  tilted  riding-hat,  her 
booted  foot  held  to  the  blaze  of  the  great  log-fire. 
A  hard,  selfish,  sentimental  woman;  and  —  was  n't 
it  really  the  only  word  for  what  he  felt  in  her?  — 
just  a  little  shoddy.  He  distinguished  it  from  the 
second-rate  nicely:  it  was  a  more  personal  matter; 
for  his  mother,  though  certainly  not  a  Follett,  was 
of  good  stock;  he  knew,  of  course,  all  about  her 
stock.  It  always  grieved  him  to  think  that  it  was 
from  her  he  had  his  yellow  hair  and  the  pale  grey 
of  his  eyes;  his  stature,  too,  for  she  had  been  a 
small  woman;  all  the  other  Folletts  were  tall;  but 
she  had  given  him  nothing  more:  not  a  trace  of  her 
beauty  was  his,  and  he  was  glad  of  it. 


DAFFODIL 


It  was  curious,  since  he  had  really  had  so  little  to 
do  with  him,  as  little,  almost,  as  with  his  mother, 
how  blissfully  his  sense  of  his  father's  presence  per 
vaded  his  childish  memories.  He  was  so  kind. 
The  kindest  thing  he  remembered  at  Channerley, 
except  his  dear  old  Nanna  and  Peter  the  spaniel. 
It  used  to  give  him  a  thrill  of  purest  joy  when, 
meeting  him,  his  father,  his  hands  clasped  behind 
his  back  after  his  strolling  wont,  would  stop  and 
bend  amused  and  affectionate  eyes  upon  him; 
rather  the  eyes,  to  be  sure,  that  he  bent  upon  his 
dogs;  but  Marmaduke  always  felt  of  him  that  he 
looked  upon  his  children,  and  upon  himself,  too, 
as  parts  of  the  pack;  and  it  was  delightful  to  be  one 
of  the  pack,  with  him. 

"Well,  old  fellow,  and  how  goes  the  world  with 
you  to-day?"  his  father  would  say. 

And  after  that  question  the  world  would  go  in 
sunshine. 

He  had  always  believed  that,  had  his  father 
lived,  he  would  never  have  been  so  forgotten;  just 
as  he  had  always  believed  that  his  father  would 
never  have  allowed  one  of  his  pack  to  be  bundled 
into  the  solicitor's  office.  For  that  he  had  to  thank, 
he  felt  sure,  not  only  Sylvia's  negative  solicitude, 
but  his  mother's  active  indifference.  Between 
them  both  they  had  done  it  to  him. 

And  he  never  felt  so  to  the  full  his  dispossession 
as  in  thinking  of  Robert.  He  had  always  intensely 
feared  and  admired  Robert.  He  did  not  know  what 
he  feared,  for  Robert  was  never  unkind.  But  Rob 
ert  was  everything  that  he  was  not:  tall  and  gay 
and  competent,  and  possessing  everything  needful, 
from  the  very  beginning,  for  the  perfect  fulfilment 
of  his  type.  The  difference  between  them  had  been 

[  ioi  I 


'DAFFODILS 

far  more  than  the  ten  years  that  had  made  of 
Robert  a  man  when  he  was  still  only  a  little  boy. 
There  had  been,  after  all,  a  time  when  they  had 
been^a  very  big  and  a  very  little  boy  together,  with 
Austin  in  between;  yet  the  link  had  seemed  always 
to  break  down  after  Austin.  Robert,  in  this  retro 
spect,  had  always  the  air  of  strolling  away  from 
him  —  for  Robert,  too,  was  a  stroller.  Not  that 
he  himself  had  had  the  air  of  pursuit;  he  had  never, 
he  felt  sure,  from  the  earliest  age,  lacked  tact;  tact 
and  reticence  and  self-effacement  had  been  bred 
into  him.  But  his  relationship  with  Robert  had 
seemed  always  to  consist  in  standing  there,  hiding 
ruefulness,  and  gazing  at  Robert's  strolling  back. 

The  difference  from  Austin  had  perhaps  been  as 
great,  but  it  had  never  hurt  so  much,  for  Austin, 
though  with  his  share  of  the  Follett  charm,  had 
never  had  the  charm  of  Robert.  A  clear-voiced 
and  clear-eyed,  masterful  boy,  Austin's  main  con 
tact  with  others  was  in  doing  things  with  them, 
and  that  sort  of  contact  did  not  mean  congeniality. 
Austin  had  made  use  of  him;  had  let  him  hold  his 
ferrets  and  field  for  him  at  cricket;  and  a  person 
whom  you  found  useful  did  not,  for  the  time  being, 
bore  you. 

But  he  had  bored  Robert  always  —  that  was 
apparent;  and  beautiful  Griselda,  who  was  older 
than  either  of  them,  and  Amy,  who  was  younger. 
Griselda  had  gazed  rather  sadly  over  his  head;  and 
Amy  had  smiled  and  teased  him  so  that  he  had  sel 
dom  ventured  on  a  remark  in  her  presence.  Even 
fat  little  Sylvia,  the  baby,  had  always  preferred  any 
of  the  others  to  him  as  she  grew  up;  had  only  not 
been  bored  because,  while  she  was  good-humoured, 
she  was  also  rather  dull.  And  at  the  bottom  of  his 

[  102] 


DAFFODILS 

heart,  rueful  always,  sore,  and  still  patiently  sur 
prised,  he  knew  that,  while  he  found  them  all  a 
little  brutal,  he  could  not  admire  them  the  less  be 
cause  of  it.  It  was  part  of  the  Follett  inheritance 
to  be  able  to  be  brutal,  unconsciously,  and  there 
fore  with  no  loss  of  bloom. 

And  now,  at  last,  he  was  not  to  bore  them  any 
longer;  at  last,  he  was  not  to  be  forgotten.  How 
could  he  not  be  happy,  —  it  brought  back  every 
blissful  thrill  of  boyhood,  his  father's  smile,  the 
daffodil  woods  in  spring,  heightened  to  ecstasy, — 
when  he  had  at  last  made  of  himself  one  of  the 
Folletts  who  were  remembered?  He  would  have 
his  place  in  the  history  beside  the  Follett  who  fell 
at  Naseby.  No  family  but  is  glad  of  a  V.C.  in  its 
annals.  They  could  no  longer  stroll  away.  They 
would  be  proud  of  him;  he  had  done  something  for 
all  the  Folletts  forever. 

II 

THE  nice  young  nurse  came  in.  She  closed  the  door 
gently,  and,  with  her  smile,  calm  before  accus 
tomed  death,  and  always,  as  it  were,  a  little  proud 
of  him,  —  that  was  because  they  were  both  Eng 
lish,  —  she  took  his  wrist  and  felt  his  pulse,  hold 
ing  her  watch  in  the  other  hand,  and  asked  him, 
presently,  how  he  felt.  Only  after  that  did  she  say, 
contemplating  him  for  a  moment,  —  Marmaduke 
wondered  how  many  hours  —  or  was  it  perhaps 
days  ?  —  she  was  giving  him  to  live,  — 

"  A  gentleman  has  come  to  see  you.  You  may  see 
him  if  you  like.  But  I  've  told  him  that  he  is  only 
to  stay  for  half  an  hour." 

The  blood  flowed  up  to  Marmaduke's  forehead. 

[  103  ] 


DAFFODILS 

He  felt  it  beating  hard  in  his  neck  and  behind  his 
ears,  and  his  heart  thumped  down  there  under  the 
neatly  drawn  bed-clothes. 

"A  gentleman?  What's  his  name?" 

Was  it  Robert? 

"Here  is  his  card,"  said  the  nurse. 

She  drew  it  from  her  pocket  and  gave  it  to  him. 
It  could  n't  have  been  Robert,  of  course.  Robert 
would  only  have  had  to  come  up.  Yet  he  was  dizzy 
with  the  disappointment.  It  was  as  if  he  saw  Rob 
ert  strolling  away  for  the  last  time.  He  would  never 
see  Robert  again. 

Mr.  Guy  Thorpe  was  the  name.  The  address  was 
a  London  club  that  Marmaduke  placed  at  once  as 
second-rate,  and  "The  Beeches,  Arlington  Road," 
in  a  London  suburb.  On  the  card  was  written  in  a 
neat  scholarly  hand:  "May  I  see  you?  We  are 
friends." 

It  was  difficult  for  a  moment  to  feel  anything  but 
the  receding  tide  of  his  hope.  The  next  thing  that 
came  was  a  sense  of  dislike  for  Mr.  Guy  Thorpe 
and  for  the  words  that  he  had  written.  Friends? 
By  what  right  since  he  did  not  know  his  name? 

"Is  he  a  soldier?"  he  asked.  "How  did  he  come? 
I  don't  know  him." 

"You  need  n't  see  him  unless  you  want  to,"  said 
the  nurse.  "No;  he's  not  a  soldier.  An  elderly 
man.  He 's  driving  a  motor  for  the  French  Wounded 
Emergency  Fund,  and  came  on  from  the  Alliance 
because  he  heard  that  you  were  here.  Perhaps  he's 
some  old  family  friend.  He  spoke  as  if  he  were." 

Marmaduke  smiled  a  little.  "That's  hardly 
likely.  But  I'll  see  him,  yes;  since  he  came  for 
that." 

When  she  had  gone,  he  lay  looking  again  at  the 

[  104  ] 


DAFFODILS 

blue  bands  across  the  window.  A  flock  of  sea-gulls 
flew  past  —  proud,  swift,  and  leisurely,  glittering 
in  the  sun.  They  seemed  to  embody  the  spendour 
and  exultation  of  his  thoughts,  and,  when  they 
had  disappeared,  he  was  sorry,  almost  desolate. 

Mr.  Guy  Thorpe.  He  took  up  the  card  again  in 
his  feeble  hand  and  looked  at  it.  And  now,  dimly, 
it  seemed  to  remind  him  of  something. 

Steps  approached  along  the  passage,  the  nurse's 
light  footfall  and  the  heavier,  careful  tread  of  a 
man.  An  oddly  polite,  almost  a  deprecating  tread. 
He  had  gone  about  a  great  many  hospitals  and  was 
cautious  not  to  disturb  wounded  men.  Yet  Mar- 
maduke  felt  again  that  he  did  not  like  Mr.  Guy 
Thorpe,  and,  as  they  came  in,  he  was  conscious  of 
feeling  a  little  frightened. 

There  was  nothing  to  frighten  one  in  Mr. 
Thorpe's  appearance.  He  was  a  tall,  thin,  ageing 
man,  travel-worn,  in  civilian  clothes,  with  a  dingy 
Red-Cross  badge  on  the  sleeve  of  his  waterproof 
overcoat.  Baldish  and  apparently  near-sighted,  he 
seemed  to  blink  towards  the  bed,  and,  as  if  with 
motoring  in  the  wind,  his  eyelids  were  moist  and 
reddened.  He  sat  down,  murmuring  some  words  of 
thanks  to  the  nurse. 

A  very  insignificant  man,  for  all  his  height  and 
his  big  forehead.  Altogether  of  The  Beeches,  Ar 
lington  Road.  Had  he  turned  grey,  he  might  have 
looked  less  shabby,  but  dark  thin  locks  still  clus 
tered  above  his  high  crown  and  behind  his  long- 
lobed  ears.  His  eyes  were  dark,  his  moustache 
drooped,  and  he  had  a  small,  straight  nose.  Mar- 
maduke  saw  that  he  was  the  sort  of  man  who,  in 
youth,  might  have  been  considered  very  handsome. 
He  looked  like  a  seedy  poet  and  some  sort  of  minor 

1 105 1 


DAFFODILS 

civil  servant  mingled,  the  civil  servant  having  got 
the  better  of  the  poet.  Marmaduke  also  imagined 
that  he  would  have  a  large  family  and  a  harassed 
but  ambitious  wife,  with  a  genteel  accent  —  a  wife 
a  little  below  himself.  His  tie  was  of  a  dull  red 
silk.  Marmaduke  did  not  like  him. 

Mr.  Thorpe  glanced  round,  as  if  cautiously,  to 
see  if  the  nurse  had  closed  the  door,  and  then,  it 
was  really  as  if  more  cautiously  still,  looked  at 
Marmaduke,  slightly  moving  back  his  chair. 

"  I  'm  very  grateful  to  you,  very  grateful  indeed," 
he  said  in  a  low  voice,  "for  seeing  me." 

" You've  come  a  long  way,"  said  Marmaduke. 

"Yes.  A  long  way.  I  had  heard  of  your  being 
here.  I  hoped  to  get  here.  I  felt  that  I  must  see  you. 
We  are  all  proud  of  you;  more  proud  than  I  can 
say." 

He  looked  down  now  at  the  motoring-cap  he 
held,  and  Marmaduke  became  aware  that  the  red 
dened  eyes  were  still  more  suffused  and  that  the 
mouth  under  the  drooping  moustache  twitched  and 
trembled.  He  could  think  of  nothing  to  say,  except 
to  murmur  something  about  being  very  glad  — • 
though  he  did  n't  want  to  say  that;  and  he  sup 
posed,  to  account  for  Mr.  Thorpe's  emotion,  that 
he  must  be  a  moving  sight,  lying  there,  wasted, 
bandaged,  and  dying. 

"  You  don't  remember  my  name,  I  suppose,"  said 
Mr.  Thorpe  after  a  moment,  in  which  he  frankly 
got  out  his  handkerchief  and  wiped  his  eyes. 

"No,  I'm  afraid  I  don't,"  said  Marmaduke  very 
politely.  He  was  glad  to  say  this.  It  was  the  sort  of 
thing  he  did  want  to  say. 

"Yet  I  know  yours  very,  very  well,"  said  Mr. 
Thorpe,  with  a  curious  watery  smile.  "I  lived  at 

[  106  ] 


DAFFODILS 

Channerley  once.  I  was  tutor  there  for  some  time 
-to  Robert,  your  brother,  and  Griselda.  Yes," 
Mr.  Thorpe  nodded,  "I  know  the  Folletts  well;  and 
Channerley,  the  dear  old  place." 

Now  the  dim  something  in  memory  pressed  for 
ward,  almost  with  a  physical  advance,  and  revealed 
itself  as  sundry  words  scratched  on  the  schoolroom 
window-panes  and  sundry  succinct  drawings  in 
battered  old  Greek  and  Latin  grammars.  Robert 
had  always  been  very  clever  at  drawing,  catching 
with  equal  facility  and  accuracy  the  swiftness  of  a 
galloping  horse  and  the  absurdities  of  a  human 
profile.  What  returned  to  Marmaduke  now,  and 
as  clearly  as  if  he  had  the  fly-leaf  before  him,  was  a 
tiny  thumb-nail  sketch  of  such  a  galloping  horse 
unseating  a  lank,  crouching  figure,  of  whom  the 
main  indications  were  the  angles  of  acute  uncer 
tainty  taken  by  the  knees  and  elbows;  and  a  more 
elaborate  portrait,  dashed  and  dotted  as  if  with  a 
ruthless  boyish  grin  —  such  an  erect  and  melan 
choly  head  it  was,  so  dark  the  tossed-back  locks,  so 
classical  the  nose  and  unclassical  the  moustache, 
and  a  brooding  eye  indicated  in  a  triangular  sweep 
of  shadow.  Beneath  was  written  in  Robert's  clear, 
boyish  hand,  "Mr.  Guy  Thorpe,  Poet,  Philosopher, 
and  Friend.  Vale."  Even  the  date  flashed  before 
him,  1880;  and  with  it  —  strange,  inappropriate 
association  —  the  daffodils  running  out  upon  the 
lawn,  as  no  doubt  he  had  seen  them  as  he  leaned 
from  the  schoolroom  window,  with  the  Greek 
grammar  under  his  elbow  on  the  sill. 

So  that  was  it.  Mr.  Guy  Thorpe,  placed,  ex 
plained,  disposed  of  —  poor  dear!  He  felt  suddenly 
quite  kindly  towards  him,  quite  touched  by  his  act 
of  loyalty  to  the  old  allegiance  in  coming;  and 

[  107] 


DAFFODILS 

flattered,  too,  —  yes,  even  by  Mr.  Thorpe,  — 
that  he  should  be  recognized  as  a  Follett  who  had 
done  something  for  the  name;  and  smiling  very 
benevolently  upon  him,  he  said:  — 

"Oh,  of  course;  I  remember  perfectly  now — • 
your  name,  and  drawings  of  you  in  old  schoolbooks, 
you  know.  All  tutors  and  governesses  get  those 
tributes  from  their  pupils,  don't  they?  But  I  my 
self  could  n't  remember,  could  I  ?  for  it  was  before 
I  was  born  that  you  were  at  Channerley." 

There  was  a  moment  of  silence  after  this,  and  in 
it  Marmaduke  felt  that  Mr.  Thorpe  did  not  like 
being  so  placed.  He  had  no  doubt  imagined  that 
there  would  be  less  ambiguous  tributes,  and  that 
his  old  pupils  would  have  talked  of  him  to  the 
younger  generation. 

And  something  of  this  chagrin  certainly  came 
out  in  his  next  words  as,  nodding  and  looking 
round  at  the  daffodils,  he  said:  — 

"Yes,  yes.  Quite  true.  No,  of  course  you 
could  n't  yourself  remember.  I  was  more  though,  I 
think  I  may  fairly  say,  than  the  usual  tutor  or 
governess.  I  came,  rather,  at  Sir  Robert's  instance." 
—  Sir  Robert  was  Marmaduke's  father.  —  "We 
had  met,  made  friends,  at  Oxford;  his  former  tutor 
there  was  an  uncle  of  mine,  and  Sir  Robert,  in  my 
undergraduate  days,  used  to  visit  him  sometimes. 
He  was  very  keen  on  getting  me  to  come.  Young 
Robert  wanted  something  of  a  firm  hand.  I  was 
the  friend  rather  than  the  mere  man  of  books  in 
the  family." 

"Poet,  Philosopher  and  Friend"  —  Marmaduke 
had  it  almost  on  his  lips,  and  almost  with  a  laugh, 
his  benevolence  deepened  for  poor  Mr.  Thorpe,  so 
self-revealed,  so  entirely  Robert's  portrait  of  him. 

F  108  1 


DAFFODILS 

Amusing  to  think  that  even  the  quite  immature 
first-rate  can  so  relegate  the  third.  But  perhaps 
it  was  a  little  unfair  to  call  poor  Mr.  Thorpe  third. 
The  Folletts  would  not  be  likely  to  choose  a  third- 
rate  man  for  a  tutor;  second  was  kinder,  and  truer. 
He  had,  obviously,  come  down  in  the  world. 

"I  see.  It's  natural  I  never  heard,  though: 
there's  such  a  chasm  between  the  elders  and  the 
youngers  in  a  big  family,  isn't  there?"  he  said. 
"Griselda  is  twelve  years  older  than  I  am,  and 
Robert  ten,  you  remember.  She  was  married  by 
the  time  1  began  my  Greek.  You  never  came  back 
to  Channerley,  did  you  ?  I  hope  things  have  gone 
well  with  you  since  those  days?" 

He  questioned,  wanting  to  be  very  kind;  want 
ing  to  give  something  of  the  genial  impression  of  his 
father  smiling,  with  his  "And  how  goes  the  world 
with  you  to-day?"  But  he  saw  that,  while  Mr. 
Thorpe's  evident  emotion  deepened,  it  was  with  a 
sense  of  present  grief  as  well  as  of  retrospective 
pathos. 

"No;  I  never  came,  —  that  is  — .  No;  I  passed 
by :  I  never  came  to  stay.  I  went  abroad ;  I  travelled, 
with  a  pupil,  for  some  years  before  my  marriage." 
Grief  and  confusion  were  oddly  mingled  in  his 
drooping  face.  "And  after  that  —  life  had  changed 
too  much.  My  dear  old  friend  Sir  Robert  had  died. 
I  could  not  have  faced  it  all.  No,  no;  when  some 
chapters  are  read,  it  is  better  to  close  the  book; 
better  to  close  the  book.  But  I  have  never  forgot 
ten  Channerley,  nor  the  Folletts  of  Channerley; 
that  will  always  remain  for  me  the  golden  page; 
the  page,"  said  Mr.  Thorpe,  glancing  round  again 
at  the  daffodils,  "of  friendship,  of  youth,  of 
daffodils  in  springtime.  I  saw  you  there,"  he 

[  109  ] 


DAFFODILS 

added  suddenly,  "once,  when  you  were  a  very  little 
lad.  I  saw  you.  I  was  passing  by;  bicycling;  no 
time  to  stop.  You  remember  the  high  road  skirts 
the  woods  to  the  north.  I  came  and  looked  over 
the  wall;  and  there  you  were  —  in  your  holland 
pinafore  and  white  socks  —  digging  up  the  daffodils 
and  putting  them  into  your  little  red-and-yellow 
cart.  A  beautiful  spring  morning.  The  woods  full 
of  sunshine.  You  would  n't  remember." 

But  he  did  remember  - —  perfectly.  Not  having 
been  seen;  but  the  day;  the  woods;  the  daffodils. 
He  had  dug  them  up  to  plant  in  his  own  little  gar 
den,  down  below.  He  had  always  been  stupid  with 
his  garden;  had  always  failed  where  the  other  suc 
ceeded.  And  he  had  wanted  to  be  sure  of  daffodils. 
And  they  had  all  laughed  at  him  for  wanting  the 
wild  daffodils  like  that  for  himself,  and  for  going 
to  get  them  in  the  wood.  And  why  had  Mr.  Thorpe 
looked  over  the  wall  and  not  come  in?  He  hated  to 
think  that  he  had  been  watched  on  that  spring 
morning  —  hated  it.  And,  curiously,  that  sense  of 
fear  with  which  he  had  heard  the  approaching  foot 
steps  returned  to  him.  It  frightened  him  that  Mr. 
Thorpe  had  watched  him  over  the  wall. 

His  distaste  and  shrinking  were  perhaps  apparent 
in  his  face,  for  it  was  with  a  change  of  tone  and 
hastiness  of  utterance,  as  though  hurrying  away 
from  something,  that  Mr.  Thorpe  went  on:  — 

"You  see,  —  it's  been  my  romance,  always, 
Channerley  —  and  all  of  you.  I've  always  fol 
lowed  your  lives  —  always  —  from  a  distance  — 
known  what  you  were  up  to.  I  Ve  made  excuses  to 
myself  —  in  the  days  when  I  used  to  go  a  good  deal 
about  the  country  —  to  pass  by  Channerley  and 
just  have  a  glimpse  of  you.  And  when  I  heard  that 

[  no] 


DAFFODILS 

you  had  done  this  noble  deed,  —  when  I  heard  what 
you  had  done  for  England,  for  Channerley,  for  us 
all,  —  I  felt  I  had  to  come  and  see  you.  You  must 
forgive  me  if  I  seem  a  mere  intruder.  I  can't  seem 
that  to  myself.  I've  cared  too  much.  And  what  I 
came  for,  really,  was  to  thank  you,  —  to  thank 
you,  my  dear  boy,  —  and  to  tell  you  that  because  of 
you,  life  must  be  nobler,  always,  for  all  of  us." 

His  words  had  effaced  the  silly,  groping  fear. 
It  was  indeed,  since  his  colonel's  visit,  the  first 
congratulation  he  had  had  from  the  outer  world. 
The  nurses,  of  course,  had  congratulated  him,  and 
the  surgeons;  but  no  one  who  knew  him  outside; 
the  kindly  telegrams  from  Robert  and  Sylvia  did 
not  count  as  congratulations.  And  in  a  way  poor 
Mr.  Thorpe  did  know  him,  and  though  it  was  only 
from  him,  it  had  its  sweetness.  He  felt  himself 
flush  as  he  answered,  "That's  very  kind  of  you." 

"Oh,  no!"  said  Mr.  Thorpe,  shaking  his  head 
and  swinging  his  foot  —  Marmaduke  knew  that 
from  the  queer  movement  of  his  body  as  he  sat 
with  very  tightly  folded  arms.  "Not  kind!  That's 
not  the  word  —  from  us  to  you !  Not  the  word  at 
all!" 

"I'm  very  happy,  as  you  may  imagine,"  said 
Marmaduke.  And  he  was  happy  again,  and  glad 
to  share  his  happiness  with  poor  Mr.  Thorpe.  "It 
makes  everything  worth  while,  does  n't  it,  to  have 
brought  it  off  at  all?" 

"Everything,  everything  —  it  would;  it  would, 
to  you.  So  heroes  feel,"  said  Mr.  Thorpe.  "To 
give  your  life  for  England.  I  know  it  all  —  in  every 
detail.  Yes,  you  are  happy  in  dying  that  England 
may  live.  Brave  boy!  Splendid  boy!" 

Now  he  was  weeping.   He  had  out  his  handker- 

t  in  j 


DAFFODILS 

chief  and  his  shoulders  shook.  It  made  Marmaduke 
want  to  cry,  too,  and  he  wondered  confusedly  if  the 
nurse  would  soon  come  back.  Had  not  the  half 
hour  passed? 

"Really  —  it's  too  good  of  you.  You  must  n't, 
you  know;  you  must  n't,"  he  murmured,  while  the 
word,  "boy  —  boy,"  repeated,  made  tangled  images 
in  his  mind,  and  he  saw  himself  in  the  white  socks 
and  with  the  little  red-and-yellow  cart,  and  then  as 
he  had  been  the  other  day,  leading  his  men,  his 
revolver  in  his  hand  and  the  bullets  flying  about 
him.  "And  I'm  not  a  boy,"  he  said;  "I'm  thirty- 
four;  absurdly  old  to  be  only  a  second  lieutenant. 
And  there  are  so  many  of  us.  Why,"  —  the  thought 
came  fantastically,  but  he  seized  it,  because  Mr. 
Thorpe  was  crying  so  and  he  must  seize  something, 

—  "we're  as  common  as  daffodils  I" 

"Ah!  not  for  me!  not  for  me!"  Mr.  Thorpe 
gulped  quickly.  Something  had  given  way  in  him 

—  as  if  the  word  "daffodils"  had  pressed  a  spring. 
He  was  sobbing  aloud,  and  he  had  fallen  on  his 
knees  by  the  bed  and  put  up  his  hand  for  Marma- 
duke's.    "I  cannot  keep  it  from  you!   Not  at  this 
last  hour!   Not  when  you  are  leaving  me  forever! 
—  My   son!    My  brave    son!    I  am  your  father, 
Marmaduke !  I  am  your  father,  my  dear,  dear  boy !  " 

III 

IT  was  the  stillest  room.  The  two  calm  bands  of 
blue  crossed  the  window.  In  the  sunlight  the  gulls 
came  flying  back.  Marmaduke  looked  out  at 
them.  Were  they  the  same  sea-gulls  or  another 
flock?  Then  quietly  he  closed  his  eyes.  Stillness  — 
calm.  But  something  else  was  rising  to  him  from 


DAFFODILS 

them.  Darkness;  darkness;  a  darkness  worse  than 
death.  Oh!  death  was  sweet  compared  to  this. 
Compared  to  this  all  his  life  had  been  sweet;  and 
something  far  dearer  than  life  was  being  taken 
from  him.  He  only  knew  the  terrible  confusion  of 
his  whole  nature. 

He  opened  his  eyes  again  with  an  instinct  of 
escape.  There  were  the  bands  of  blue,  and,  still 
passing  in  their  multitudes,  leaving  him  forever, 
the  proud,  exultant  sea-gulls.  The  man  still  knelt 
beside  him.  He  heard  his  own  voice  come:  — 

"What  do  you  mean?" 

"I  never  meant  to  tell  you!  I  never  meant  to 
tell  you!"  a  moan  answered  him.  "But  —  seeing 
you  lying  there!  —  dying!  —  my  son!  —  who  has 
given  his  life  for  England !  —  And  how  I  have  longed 
for  you  all  these  years!  —  My  romance,  Marma- 
duke  —  How  could  I  be  silent?  Forgive  me!  For 
give  me,  my  boy.  Yes,  mine.  My  known  children 
are  dear  to  me,  but  how  far  dearer  the  unknown 
son,  seen  only  by  stealth,  in  snatched  glimpses! 
It  is  true,  Marmaduke,  true.  We  were  lovers.  She 
loved  me.  Do  not  ask.  Do  not  question.  We  were 
young.  She  was  very  beautiful.  It  was  spring 
time;  daffodils  were  in  the  woods.  She  said  that 
she  had  never  known  any  one  like  me.  She  said  that 
her  life  was  hollow,  meaningless.  I  opened  doors 
to  her,  I  read  to  her.  Browning  —  I  read  Brown 
ing,"  he  muttered  on,  "in  the  woods;  among  the 
daffodils.  It  was  a  new  life  to  her  —  and  to  me. 
And  we  were  swept  away.  Don't  blame  us,  Mar 
maduke.  If  there  was  wrong,  there  was  great 
beauty  —  then.  Only  then;  for  after,  she  was 
cruel  —  very  cruel.  She  turned  from  me;  she 
crushed  and  tore  my  heart.  Oh !  —  I  have  suffered ! 


DAFFODILS 

But  no  one  knew.  No  one  ever  dreamed  of  it.  Only 
she  and  I.  My  God!  —  I  see  her  in  your  hair  and 
eyes!" 

It  was  true.  It  was  absolutely  true.  Through 
his  whole  being  he  felt  its  inevitability.  Everything 
was  clear,  with  a  strange,  black,  infernal  clearness. 
His  life  lay  open  before  him,  open  from  beginning  to 
end :  that  beginning  of  tawdry  sentiment  and  shame 
—  with  daffodils;  and  this  end,  with  daffodils  again, 
and  again  with  tawdry  sentiment  and  shame. 

He  was  not  a  Follett.  He  had  no  part  in  the 
Folletts.  He  had  no  part  in  Channerley.  He  was 
an  interloper,  a  thief.  He  was  the  son  of  this 
wretched  man,  in  whose  very  grief  he  could  detect 
the  satisfaction  —  oh,  who  more  fitted  to  detect 
such  satisfaction !  —  of  his  claim  upon  a  status  above 
his  own.  He  was  all  that  he  had  always  most 
despised,  a  second-rate,  a  third-rate  little  creature; 
the  anxious,  civil,  shrinking  Marmalade  of  Cauld- 
well's  office.  Why  (as  the  hideous  moments  led 
him  on,  point  by  point,  his  old  lucidity,  sharpened 
to  a  needle  fineness,  seemed  to  etch  the  truth  in 
lines  of  fire  upon  the  blackness),  had  n't  he  always 
been  a  pitiful  little  snob?  Was  n't  it  of  the  essence 
of  a  snob  to  over-value  the  things  one  had  n't  and 
to  fear  the  things  one  was?  It  had  n't  been  other 
people,  it  had  been  himself,  what  he  really  was,  of 
whom  he  had  always  been  afraid.  He  saw  himself 
reduced  to  the  heretofore  unrecognized,  yet  always 
operative,  element  in  his  own  nature  —  a  timid, 
watchful  humility. 

Oh,  Channerley!  Channerley!  The  wail  rose  in 
his  heart  and  it  filled  the  world.  Oh,  his  woods,  his 
daffodils,  his  father's  smile  —  gone  —  lost  forever! 
Worse  than  that  —  smirched,  withered,  desecrated ! 


DAFFODILS 

A  hideous  gibbering  of  laughter  seemed  to  rise 
around  him,  and  pointing  fingers.  Amy's  eyes 
passed  with  another  malice  in  their  mockery;  and 
Robert  would  never  turn  to  him  now,  and  Griselda 
would  never  look  at  him.  He  saw  it  all,  as  they 
would  never  see  it.  He  was  not  one  of  them,  and 
they  had  always  felt  it;  and  oh,  —  above  all,  —  he 
had  always  felt  it.  And  now,  quite  close  it  seemed, 
softly  rustling,  falsely  smiling,  moved  his  loath 
some  mother:  not  only  as  he  remembered  her  in 
youth,  but  in  her  elegant  middle  years,  as  he  had 
last  seen  her,  with  hard  eyes  and  alien  lips  and  air 
of  brittle,  untouched  exquisiteness. 

Suddenly  fury  so  mounted  in  him  that  he  saw 
himself  rising  in  bed,  rending  his  dressings,  to 
seize  the  kneeling  man  by  the  throat  and  throttle 
him.  He  could  see  his  fingers  sinking  in  on  either 
side  among  the  clustered  hair,  and  hear  himself 
say,  "How  dare  you!  How  dare  you!  You  hound! 
You  snivelling,  sneaking  hound!  You  look  for 
pity  from  me,  do  you!  —  and  tenderness!  Well, 
take  this,  this!  Everything,  everything  I  am  and 
have  that's  worth  being  and  having,  I  owe  to  them. 
I  Ve  hated  you  and  all  you  mean,  always  —  yes, 
your  fear  and  your  caution  and  your  admiration 
and  your  great  high  forehead.  Oh,  I  see  it!  I  see 
it!  —  it's  my  own!  And  though  I  am  only  that  in 
myself,  then  take  it  from  me  that  I  hate  myself 
along  with  you  and  curse  myself  with  you!" 

It  came  to  him  that  he  was  slowly  panting,  and 
that  after  the  fever-fury  an  icy  chill  crept  over  him. 
And  a  slow,  cold  smile  came  with  it,  and  he  saw 
Jephson,  the  wit  of  the  office,  wagging  his  head  and 
saying,  "Little  Marmalade  take  a  man  by  the 
throat!  Ask  me  another!" 


DAFFODILS 

No;  little  Marmalade  might  win  the  V.C.;  but 
only  when  he  thought  he  was  a  Follett.  Was  that 
what  it  all  came  to,  really?  Something  broke  and 
stopped  in  his  mind. 

He  heard  his  father's  voice.  How  long  ago  it  had 
all  happened.  He  had  known  for  years,  had  n't  he, 
that  this  was  his  father? 

"Marmaduke!  Mr.  Follett!  What  have  I  done? 
Shall  I  call  somebody?  Oh,  forgive  me!" 

His  father  was  standing  now  beside  him  and 
bending  over  him.  He  looked  up  at  him  and  shook 
his  head.  He  did  not  want  any  one  to  come. 

"Oh,  what  have  I  done?"  the  man  repeated. 

"I  was  dying  anyway,  you  know,"  he  heard 
himself  say. 

What  a  pitiful  face  it  was,  this  weary,  loosened, 
futureless  old  face  above  him!  What  a  frightened 
face!  What  long  years  of  slow  disgarnishing  lay 
behind  it:  youth,  romance,  high  hopes,  all  dropped 
away.  He  had  come  to-day  with  their  last  vestiges, 
still  the  sentimental,  romancing  fool,  self-centred 
and  craving;  but  nothing  of  that  was  left.  He  was 
beaten,  at  last,  down  into  the  very  ground.  It  was 
a  haggard,  humiliated,  frightened  face,  and  misera 
ble.  As  he  himself  had  been.  But  not  even  death 
lay  before  this  face.  For  how  many  years  must  it 
go  on  sinking  down  until  the  earth  covered  it? 
Marmaduke  seemed  to  understand  all  about  him, 
as  well  as  if  he  had  been  himself. 

"  Sit  down,"  he  said.  He  heard  that  his  voice  was 
gentle,  though  he  was  not  aware  of  feeling  any 
thing,  only  of  understanding.  "  I  was  rather  upset. 
No;  I  don't  want  any  one.  Of  course  I  forgive  you. 
Don't  bother  about  it,  I  beg." 

His  father  sat  down,  keeping  his  swollen  eyes  on 

[116] 


DAFFODILS 

the  motoring-cap  which,  unseeingly,  he  turned  and 
turned  in  his  hands. 

"Tell  me  about  yourself  a  little,"  said  Marma- 
duke,  with  slow,  spaced  breaths.  "Where  do  you 
live?  How?  Are  you  fairly  happy?" 

He  knew  that  he  was  not  happy;  but  he  might, 
like  most  people  with  whom  life  had  not  succeeded, 
often  imagine  himself  so,  and  Marmaduke  wanted 
to  help  him,  if  possible,  to  imagine  it. 

"I  live  near  London.  I  used  to  do  a  good  deal  of 
University  Extension  lecturing.  I've  a  clerkship  in 
the  Education  Office  now."  Mr.  Thorpe  spoke  in  a 
dead  obedient  voice.  "A  small  salary,  not  much 
hope  of  advance;  and  I've  a  large  family.  It's 
rather  up-hill,  of  course.  But  I've  good  children; 
clever  children.  My  eldest  boy's  at  Oxford;  he 
took  a  scholarship  at  Westminster;  and  my  eldest 
girl's  at  Girton.  The  second  girl,  Winnie,  has  a 
very  marked  gift  for  painting;  she  is  our  artist; 
we  're  going  to  send  her  to  the  Slade  next  year  when 
she  leaves  the  High  School.  Good  children.  I've 
nothing  to  complain  of." 

"So  you're  fairly  happy?"  Marmaduke  re 
peated.  Oddly,  he  felt  himself  comforted  in  hearing 
about  the  good  and  happy  children,  in  hearing 
about  Winnie,  her  father's  favourite. 

"Happy?  Well,  just  now,  with  this  terrible  war, 
one  can't  be  that,  can  one?  It  is  a  great  adventure 
for  me,  however,  this  work  of  mine,  motoring 
about  France.  I  don't  think  I've  ever  done  any 
thing  I  cared  so  much  about  since  —  for  years," 
said  Mr.  Thorpe.  "It's  a  beautiful  country,  is  n't 
it?  and  the  soldiers  are  such  splendid  fellows! 
One  gets  a  lot  out  of  it.  But  happy?  No,  I  don't 
suppose  I  am.  I'm  pretty  much  of  a  failure,  and 


DAFFODILS 

I  started  life  with  great  imaginings  about  myself. 
One  does  n't  get  over  that  sort  of  disappointment; 
one  never  really  gets  over  it  in  a  way."  Mr.  Thorpe 
was  looking  at  him  now,  and  it  was  as  if  there  were 
a  kindliness  between  them.  "  Things  have  been 
rather  grey  and  disagreeable  on  the  whole,"  he 
said. 

"They  can  be  very  grey  and  disagreeable,  can't 
they?"  said  Marmaduke,  closing  his  eyes. 

He  was  very  tired,  and  as  he  lay  there  quietly, 
having  nothing  further  to  know  or  to  suffer,  having 
reached  the  very  limits  of  conscious  dissolution, 
something  else  began  to  come  to  him.  It  seemed 
born  of  the  abolition  of  self  and  of  the  acceptance 
of  the  fact  that  he  was  dead  to  all  that  had  given 
life  worth  or  beauty.  It  would  have  been  very 
good  to  be  a  Follett;  though,  he  saw  it  now,  he  had 
over-prized  that  special  sort  of  goodness  —  with 
so  much  else  from  which  he  had  been,  as  really, 
shut  out;  but  he  was  not  a  Follett;  nor  was  he 
merely  this  poor,  insignificant  father.  He  did  not 
quite  make  out  in  what  the  difference  lay  and  he 
did  not  rejoice  in  it,  for  there  was  no  rejoicing  left 
in  him.  But,  even  if  the  difference  were  only 
an  acquired  instinct  (dimly,  the  terms  of  his  com 
placent  readings  in  biology  and  sociology  returned 
to  him),  even  if  it  were  only  that,  not  anything 
inherent  and  transmissible,  it  was,  all  the  same,  his 
own  possession;  something  that  he  and  the  Folletts 
had  made  together;  so  that  it  was  as  true  to  say 
that  he  had  won  the  V.C.  as  to  say  that  they  had. 
The  lessened  self  that  was  left  to  him  had  still  its 
worth.  To  see  the  truth,  even  if  it  undid  you,  was 
worthy;  to  see  so  unwaveringly  that  it  was  good 
to  be  a  Follett  even  when  you  were  n't  one,  had 

[  118  1 


DAFFODILS 

the  elements  of  magnanimity;  and  to  accept  the 
fact  of  being  second-rate  proved,  did  it  not?  —  if 
you  still  cared  to  prove  it;  he  felt  himself  smile  as 
gently  at  the  relinquished  self  as  he  had  smiled 
at  his  father,  —  that  you  were  not  merely  second- 
rate. 

There  was  now  a  sound  of  stumbling  movement; 
doors  opening  and  shutting;  nurses,  surgeons  in  the 
room;  and  his  father's  face,  far  away,  against  the 
blue  bands,  looking  at  him,  still  so  frightened  and 
so  miserable  that  he  tried  again  to  smile  at  him 
and  to  say,  "It's  all  right.  Quite  all  right." 

At  all  events  he  had  been  decent  to  the  poor  old 
fellow.  His  thoughts  came  brokenly,  but  he  was 
still  seeing  something,  finding  something;  it  was 
like  a  soft  light  growing.  At  all  events,  he  had 
behaved  as  a  Follett  would  wish  to  behave  even 
when  brought  to  such  a  pass.  No  —  but  it  was  n't 
quite  that,  either;  it  was  something  new.  He  had 
behaved  as  any  one  decent  should  wish  to  behave. 
And  the  daffodils  glimmering  to  his  vision  seemed 
to  light  him  further  still.  "We  are  as  common  as 
daffodils,"  came  back  to  him.  Daffodils  were  for 
everybody.  Foolish  little  boy  who,  on  the  distant 
spring  morning  in  the  woods  of  Channerley,  dug 
them  up  to  take  them  to  his  own  garden! 

He  was  there  among  them  with  his  little  red-and- 
yellow  cart,  and  the  thrush  was  singing  high  above 
him,  in  the  rosy  topmost  branches  of  an  elm. 

Beautiful  woods.  Beautiful  flowers  of  light  and 
chivalry.  How  the  sunshine  streamed  among 
them! 

"Dear  Channerley,"  he  thought.  For  again  he 
seemed  to  belong  there. 

Gentle  hands  were  tending  him  and,  as  he  turned 


DAFFODILS 


his  cheek  on  the  pillow,  it  was  with  the  comfort  — 
almost  that  of  the  little  boy  at  Channerley  being 
tucked  up  in  the  warm  nursery  to  go  to  sleep  —  of 
knowing  that  he  was  dying,  and  that,  in  spite  of 
everything,  he  had  given  something  to  the  name. 


PALSIES 


course  it  is  a  horrid  little  garden, 
but  one  gets  so  fond  of  one's  own 
things,  even  when  they  are  horrid," 
said  Miss  Edith  Glover,  with  her 
^.  gentle  deprecatory  laugh. 

She  stood  with  her  friend  at  the 
door  of  the  conservatory  that  led 
from  the  sitting-room  to  the  oblong  plot  of  garden 
—  a  small,  middle-aged  woman,  with  soft  brown 
eyes,  and  hair  the  colour  of  a  faded  leaf;  her  wasted 
throat  and  transparent  temples  and  faint  yet  fever 
ish  flush  marking  her  already  with  menacing  symp 
toms. 

The  conservatory  was  of  the  sort  that  crops  out 
irrelevantly  at  the  back  of  the  many  suburban 
houses,  like  glaucous  fungi;  but  in  Miss  Glover's 
little  establishment,  its  shelves  filled  with  neatly 
ranged  boxes  of  seedlings,  with  bundles  of  raffia, 
tidy  baskets,  and  carefully  garnered  labels,  it  was 
completely  utilitarian,  with  never  a  fern  or  begonia 
to  recall  its  usual  state.  Miss  Glover's  house  was 
suburban,  or  nearly  so,  for  though  it  stood  in 
secure  detachment  from  other  villas  on  the 
southern  slopes  of  a  small  Surrey  town,  the  town, 
on  its  northern  side,  spread  into  ugly  patches  of 
red  brick  that  devoured  the  woods  and  fields  and 


P4NSIES 

ran  long  tentacles  almost  up  to  London.  Acacia 
Road  was  removed  from  this  peril  of  vitality,  and 
its  upper  windows  looked  over  pleasant  stretches 
of  untouched  hill  and  meadow. 

The  Nook  had  been  left  to  Miss  Glover  by  an 
aunt  five  years  ago,  and  to  her  it  was,  from  its 
porch  before  to  its  garden  behind,  a  paradise  pure 
and  simple,  though  she  described  her  garden  now, 
in  showing  it  to  Florrie  Lennard,  so  disparagingly. 
If  she  called  it  horrid,  however,  it  was  only  because, 
with  her  strong  sense  of  other  people's  claims  and 
opinions,  she  recognized  that  to  Florrie,  accustomed 
to  grand  week-ends  at  big  country-places,  it  must, 
qua  garden,  look  very  dim  and  meagre.  That  it 
must  also  look,  in  its  humility,  very  lovely,  she  took 
for  granted. 

Mrs.  Lennard,  however,  standing  with  her  on  the 
conservatory  step,  her  robust  silken  arm  protect- 
ingly  and  benevolently  laid  within  hers,  did  not 
contradict  her,  though  her  cheerful  eyes  roamed 
kindly  over  the  borders  of  pansies,  the  beds  of 
mignonette,  and  the  clumps  of  sweet  peas  in  the 
corners;  but  her  kindness  was  for  her  friend  rather 
than  for  the  garden,  and  she  said,  "You  have  n't 
had  strength,  I  expect,  for  doing  more  with  it." 

"I've  never  had  much  strength,"  said  Miss 
Glover.  "It  does  n't  want  much  hard  work, 
luckily.  The  pansies  go  on  from  year  to  year  and 
only  need  dividing  in  the  autumn,  and  then  there 
are  the  bulbs,  of  course,  in  spring;  I  have  crocuses 
and  daffodils  and  narcissi  and  some  beautiful  tulips. 
The  rest  I  do  with  penny  packets.  All  those  sweet 
peas  and  all  that  mignonette  came  from  two  penny 
packets." 

"You  can't  expect  much  for  a  penny,  can  you?" 

f  122  1 


PANSIES 

said  Mrs.  Lennard  with  her  rather  jovial  air;  and 
now  she  stepped  down  onto  the  narrow  strip  of 
lawn  that  had  a  bird-bath  sunken  in  the  middle 
and  a  rose-bush  at  each  corner,  of  the  kind  now 
seldom  seen,  known  as  Prince  Charlie  or  Maid 
en's  Blush  —  dark  and  small  of  foliage,  with  flat 
flowers  that  would  be  snowy  were  they  not  tinged 
with  a  cold  pink.  They  always  made  Miss  Glover 
think  of  an  old  Scotch  ballad.  Their  flowering 
season  was  over,  now,  however.  The  old  Pyrus 
japonica  that  grew  against  the  wall  was  also,  long 
since,  over,  though  its  fresh,  vigorous  green  em 
bossed  the  dull  bricks;  but  on  the  wall  opposite,  a 
Madame  Alfred  Carriere  was  throwing  out  a  second 
blooming,  dreamy,  melancholy  and  romantic  as 
only  she  could  be.  Madame  Alfred  Carriere  made 
Miss  Glover  think  of  a  Chopin  waltz,  and  she 
hoped  that  Florrie  might  at  all  events  remark  fav 
ourably  on  her  abundance.  But  Florrie  hardly 
glanced  at  her.  Pausing,  as  they  paced  the  lawn, 
to  look  with  tolerant  interest  at  the  bird-bath,  she 
observed, 

"I've  just  been  staying  with  the  Isaacsons  in 
Hertfordshire.  Such  a  lovely  place.  They've  a 
broad  sanded  walk  leading  from  the  house  to  the 
rose-garden,  as  long  as  —  well,  to  the  end  of  this 
road,  and  it's  arched  with  roses  all  the  way,  a 
regular  roof  of  roses,  the  latest  climbers;  I  never 
saw  such  a  sight.  And  their  herbaceous  border, 
even  now,  is  a  blaze  of  colour.  I  wish  you 
could  see  it.  It  would  do  you  good.  It  did  me  good, 
I  know.  I  told  Mrs.  Isaacson  I  always  feel  a  better 
woman  after  a  week-end  in  her  garden.  Flowers 
mean  so  much  to  me.  I  can't  get  on  without  them. 
I  run  down  to  the  Isaacsons  whenever,  as  I  say  to 

1 123 1 


PANSIES 

her,  I  need  an  aesthetic  cocktail.  Of  course  they've 
half  a  dozen  gardeners  working  from  dawn  till 
dewy  eve.  You  can  do  pretty  much  what  you  want 
in  the  way  of  gardens  when  you  're  as  rich  as  the 
Isaacsons.  What  it  must  have  cost  them  to  make 
that  sunken  rose-garden!  —  all  flagged  between 
the  beds,  with  a  sun-dial,  and  a  fountain  in  the 
middle  and  bowers  of  roses  all  about.  They  ter 
raced  the  lawns,  too,  with  flights  of  stone  steps 
leading  down  one  from  the  other,  and  great  white 
stone  vases  on  the  pilasters  simply  foaming  over, 
my  dear,  with  pink  geraniums.  Against  the  blue 
sky  it's  dazzling. 

"Such  nice  people  they  are,  too,  the  Isaacsons. 
Di,  the  eldest  girl,  is  marrying  Lord  Haymouth 
next  week,  you  know.  People  says  it's  a  manage  de 
convenance,  of  course,  for  she's  to  have  £50,000  and 
he's  without  the  proverbial  penny.  But  I  happen 
to  know  it's  a  love  match:  love  at  first  sight;  a 
regular  coup  de  foudre.  I  was  with  the  Isaacsons 
at  Ascot  this  spring  when  they  met,  and  I  saw  in  a 
moment  that  Di's  fate  was  sealed.  Do  you  remem 
ber  the  big  photo  of  Di  in  court  dress  on  the  piano 
in  the  flat?  No?  Well,  I  should  have  thought  it 
could  n't  have  escaped  notice.  Such  a  splendid 
young  creature;  dark,  proud,  glowing  beauty.  I 
think,  when  they're  young,  there's  nothing  to  beat 
a  beautiful  Jewess.  She  has  a  gorgeous  voice,  too, 
Di;  could  have  made  her  fortune  in  grand  opera. 
I've  given  her  a  gold  cigarette-case  with  her 
monogram  in  diamonds  and  rubies.  It  nearly  broke 
me;  but  they've  always  been  simply  sweet  to  me. 
She's  very  fond  of  smoking.  Smokes  too  much,  her 
mother  and  I  tell  her,  though  I'm  afraid  I'm  not  a 
very  good  example  to  set  before  the  young!" 

[  124] 


P4NSIES 

Mrs.  Lennard's  face,  while  she  thus  spoke,  ex 
pressed  her  contentment  with  the  Isaacsons,  with 
herself,  the  cigarette-case,  and  life  in  general.  It 
was  large  and  ruddy  and  masterful,  with  aquiline 
nose  and  small,  jocund  mouth  creasing  to  the  chin 
in  a  deep  line  that  spoke  of  good  nature  and  in 
genuous  sensuality;  the  full  throat  supported  by  a 
high  lace  collar,  well  boned  up  behind  the  ears;  the 
prominent  blue  eyes  at  once  bland  and  beaming. 
She  was  tall,  of  a  fine  presence,  her  handsome 
bosom  thickly  decorated  with  turquoise  ornaments, 
her  shoes  of  glittering  patent  leather;  and  from  her 
wrist  dangled  a  purse  of  fringed  and  woven  gold  — 
an  offering  to  her  from  the  proprietor  of  the  lady's 
paper  that,  for  many  years,  she  had  edited  with  so 
much  flair  and  ability. 

She  had  made  a  very  good  thing  of  her  life,  had 
Mrs.  Lennard;  and,  nearing  the  fifties  as  she  was, 
she  had  amassed  a  small  but  secure  income  and  a 
large  number  of  affluent  friends;  friends  always 
engaged  in  vigorous  and  costly  pursuits  that  in 
volved  many  rich  toilettes,  meals  to  the  sound  of 
orchestras  in  sumptuous  restaurants  and  constant 
motoring  from  place  to  place.  Among  such  friends 
poor  Edie  Glover  had  not  counted.  She  and  Mrs. 
Lennard  had  been  schoolmates  in  early  days  when 
their  fortunes,  one  as  the  daughter  of  a  poor  parson 
and  one  of  a  poor  doctor,  were  equally  unpromising. 
But  Florrie  had  married  an  ambitious  young 
journalist,  typified  always,  in  Miss  Glover's  mem 
ory,  from  her  one  rather  dazed  and  shrinking  im 
pression  of  him,  by  extraordinarily  smart  mustard- 
coloured  spats  and  the  weighty  and  imposing  seal 
ring  on  his  finger;  and,  though  early  widowed, 
Florrie  had  followed  along  the  paths  where  he  had 


P4NSIES 

set  her  feet  with  an  energy  and  shrewdness  that 
he  could  not  have  bettered. 

Meanwhile,  poor  Edie  —  for  so  Mrs.  Lennard 
always  thought  of  her  —  struggled  through  many 
years  of  waning  youth  to  make  her  living,  and  sup 
port  her  mother,  as  a  music-teacher  in  London. 
Mrs.  Lennard,  even  when  the  tides  of  her  own  for 
tune  ran  low,  never  lost  sight  of  her.  She  had  al 
ways  been  the  kindest  of  friends,  sowing  the  Glov 
ers'  dun-coloured  days  with  "complimentary" 
theatre  or  concert  tickets  and  asking  them  fre 
quently  to  tea  with  her  at  her  club.  Even  after 
Edie,  now  alone  in  the  world,  had  retired  to  Acacia 
Road  and  left  youth  and  London  behind  her,  Mrs. 
Lennard,  who  had  the  air  of  fully  possessing  both, 
kept  constantly  in  touch.  She  had  never  before 
managed,  it  was  true,  but  for  one  half  hour  as  she 
motored  by  on  a  winter's  day,  to  visit  Acacia  Road ; 
but  it  was  to  her  flat  in  Victoria  Street  that  Miss 
Glover  always  came  when  called  to  London  by 
mild  necessities  or  pleasures.  Florrie  insisted  on  it; 
and  though,  in  some  ways,  Miss  Glover  would  have 
preferred  the  house  of  her  cousin  in  Bayswater,  — 
overflowing  with  children  as  it  was,  and  offering 
only  the  tiniest  of  back  bedrooms  on  the  top  floor, 
—  or  the  villa  of  a  school-mistress  friend  at  Golder's 
Green,  it  had  always  been  impossible  to  resist 
Florrie's  determined  benevolence. 

"Nonsense,  my  dear  Edie,"  she  would  say. 
"Your  cousin  can't  want  you.  You  '11  only  be  in  the 
way,  with  those  dozens  of  children.  And  as  for 
Golder's  Green,  what  can  you  see  of  London  from 
Golder's  Green?"  (Florrie  overlooked  the  fact  that 
for  forty-odd  years  Miss  Glover  had  done  nothing 
but  "see"  London.)  "You'll  be  worn  out  with 

[  126] 


P4NSIES 

tubes  and  motor-buses  if  you  go  to  Golder's  Green. 
Whereas  with  me  you  are  ten  minutes  from  every 
where,  be  it  dentist  or  dressmaker  or  concert,  and 
your  bedroom 's  waiting  for  you  — Muriel  Lestrange 
left  me  only  last  Monday;  and  you  can't  make  me 
believe  you'd  not  rather  have  your  bath  in  my 
lovely  porcelain  tub,  with  steaming  hot  water  day 
and  night,  than  in  one  of  those  awful,  antediluvian, 
blistered  monsters,  that  fold  you  up  like  a  jack- 
knife  —  and  the  tin  of  tepid  water  hauled  up  four 
flights  by  a  slavey.  I  know  my  London,  my  dear, 
through  and  through,  and  any  pleasure  here  de 
pends  upon  how  you  start  your  day;  upon  your 
bath  and  your  breakfast.  I  can't  offer  much,  but 
I  can  offer  both  of  those,  A  number  one." 

So  she  could.  Miss  Glover  could  not  deny  it, 
though  loyally  and  unheededly  murmuring  that 
the  villa  at  Golder's  Green  had  also  its  bathroom. 
It  could  n't,  however,  compare  with  Florrie's,  all 
snowy  tiles  and  glittering  taps  and  ranged  jars  and 
bottles  of  salts  and  scents.  Florrie's  bathroom 
seemed  to  her  always  to  be  the  very  centre  and 
symbol  of  Florrie's  life  —  modern,  invigorating, 
rejuvenating,  at  once  utilitarian  and  decorative. 
It  was  a  sort  of  brilliant  magician's  cave  from  which 
all  the  rest  radiated:  the  compact  yet  so  sump 
tuous  little  drawing-room  with  its  baby-grand 
and  its  palm,  its  silver-framed  photographs,  frilled 
cretonnes,  and  rose-coloured  carpet;  the  dining- 
room,  even  more  compact,  yet,  in  its  sobriety, 
as  sumptuous  —  where  the  breakfasts  always,  in 
spite  of  familiarity,  broke  upon  Miss  Glover  as 
revelations  of  what  coffee  and  rolls  and  kidneys  and 
bacon  could  be  in  the  way  of  strength  and  heat  and 
crispness;  even  the  pink  silk  quilt  beneath  which 

[  127  ] 


PANSIES 

she  crept  at  night,  and  the  little  maid  who  brought 
her  early  tea,  looking,  in  her  fluted  caps  and  aprons, 
as  though  she  belonged  to  a  theatrical  troupe  — 
all  seemed  emanations  of  that  magic  centre  where 
Florrie  lay  of  a  morning  in  hot,  scented  water  and 
read  the  paper  and  smoked  a  cigarette  before  emerg 
ing  armed  and  panoplied  for  the  avocations  and 
gaieties  of  the  day. 

Yet  it  was  not  so  much  Florrie's  bathroom  and 
breakfasts,  or  even  Florrie's  kindness,  that  over 
bore  her  protests  as  Florrie's  determination,  her 
way  of  knowing  so  much  better  than  you  yourself 
could  know  what  was  not  only  good,  but  happy 
for  you.  There  was  never  an  answer  to  be  found 
to  her;  and  though  Florrie's  flat,  with  all  its 
sumptuousness,  dazed  and  even  tired  Miss  Glover 
a  little,  just  as  dear  Florrie  herself  sometimes 
dazed  and  tired  her,  she  found  herself  installed 
there  always,  feeling  her  own  pursuits,  her  little  tea- 
parties,  her  concerts,  her  timid,  bewildered  shop 
ping,  to  be  very  humdrum  and  inappropriate  as 
issuing  from  such  a  base  of  operations.  The  only 
return  she  was  able  to  make  was  to  emboss  Flor 
rie's  sheets  and  towels  and  table-linen  with  beauti 
fully  embroidered  monograms,  and  she  had  always 
a  slight  and  pleasant  sense  of  being,  at  all  events,  a 
country  mouse  who  had  contributed  its  little  offer 
ing  of  grain  or  honey  when  she  recognized  these 
trophies  of  her  craft  on  her  bed  and  on  the  table 
and  in  the  bathroom. 

But  the  last  time  she  had  gone  up  that  summer, 
only,  now,  three  weeks  ago,  she  had  found  herself 
suddenly  of  a  significance  almost  as  great  as  that 
of  any  of  Florrie's  brilliant  friends.  To  become  sig 
nificant  to  Florrie  one  had  either  to  be  brilliant  or 

128 


P4NSIES 

piteous,  and  she  was  piteous.  Florrie  had  gone 
with  her  to  the  doctor's,  and  it  was  Florrie,  kind 
Florrie,  an  arm  about  her  shoulders  and  a  breast 
spread  to  her  tired  head,  who  had  broken  to  her 
the  verdict. 

She  was  menaced,  gravely  menaced. — Yes;  it 
did  not  surprise  her  —  she  had  thought  it  might  be 
that.  She  had  seen  her  father  and  two  sisters  die  of 
it  —  And  unless  she  could  go  away  and  spend  a 
year  in  a  Swiss  open-air  cure,  the  doctor  did  n't 
think  she'd  live  through  the  winter. 

Seated  on  Florrie's  frilled  sofa,  while  Florrie,  all 
encompassing  tact  and  urgency,  passed  on  the 
verdict,  it  was  not  of  it  that  she  first  thought.  Her 
mind,  perhaps  in  an  instinctive  recoil,  fixed  itself 
upon  the  oddly  insistent  impression  of  pinkness 
that  she  was  aware,  suddenly,  of  receiving.  Flor 
rie's  blouse,  under  her  cheek,  was  a  bright  blur  of 
pink;  and  when  she  turned  her  eyes  away  from 
that  they  met,  everywhere,  garlands  of  roses 
looped  with  knots  of  blue  ribbon  on  a  background 
of  white  and  pink  stripes.  Too  much  pink:  this 
was  the  absurdly  irrelevant  criticism  that,  dimly, 
but  as  if  culminatingly,  emerged.  She  must  have 
felt  it  as  too  pink  for  many  years,  but  only  now 
was  she  aware  of  it.  And  then,  with  a  sense  of 
refuge,  came  the  vision  of  her  pansies:  those  bor 
ders  of  white  and  purple  pansies  under  the  dull 
brick  wall  that  she  had  looked  at  so  fondly  that 
morning  before  starting  for  her  journey.  But  she 
would  have  to  leave  her  pansies,  then;  not  only  for 
a  season;  perhaps  forever. 

It  was  in  this  form  and  in  this  roundabout  way 
that  the  thought  of  death  became  real  to  her;  with 
pathos  rather  than  poignancy  and  with  yearning 


PANSIES 

regret  rather  than  fear.  She  did  not  feel  afraid  of 
dying.  Her  quiet  little  faith  that,  though  so  still, 
was  deep  enough  for  all  her  needs,  had  sunken 
wells  of  wordless  security  in  her.  She  was  not 
afraid;  but  the  thought  of  leaving  her  flowers,  her 
garden,  the  skyey  view  from  her  bedroom  window, 
symbolized  for  her  all  the  sadness  of  death.  There 
was,  indeed,  nothing  else  to  regret  much.  Every  one 
she  had  loved  most  dearly  was  gone;  and  when  all 
was  said  and  done,  and  in  spite  of  the  peace  of  the 
last  five  years,  she  was  a  battered,  tired  little 
creature,  with  few  of  the  springs  of  desire  left  in  her. 
Her  life,  as  she  looked  back  on  it,  seemed  to  have 
been  spent,  for  the  most  part,  in  crowded  buses  on 
wet  evenings,  with  not  enough  lunch  behind  and 
,  not  enough  dinner  before  her;  in  those,  and  in 
going  up  and  down  steps  of  strangers'  houses. 
There  had  been,  of  course,  more  than  that;  she 
had  never,  except  when  her  dearest  young  sister 
died,  been  very  unhappy,  and  there  had  been  in 
terests  and  alleviations  always  —  beautiful  evening 
walks  across  the  Park  and  relaxations  over  tea 
with  a  book  before  the  fire  in  her  lodging-house 
sitting-room;  but  the  past,  when  she  called  it  up 
in  an  image,  seemed  always  to  crumple  into  that 
jolting,  rattling,  wet,  and  crowded  omnibus.  So 
there  was  not  much  strength  now  left  in  her  for 
resistance  or  regret;  but  she  would  do  her  best  to 
live,  and  that  really  meant  that  she  would  do  her 
best  not  yet  to  leave  her  garden. 

When  she  was  older,  too  old  to  dig  a  little,  divide 
the  pansies  in  autumn  and  sow  the  penny  packets 
in  spring,  too  old  to  care  for  the  Madame  Alfred 
Carriere  or  the  Pyrus  japonica,  would  be  time 
enough  to  go.  But  in  coming  back  to  it  that  eve- 

[  130  ] 


P4NSIES 

ning,  she  knew  how  deeply,  how  tenaciously  she 
loved  her  garden.  It  was  the  only  thing  she  had  ever 
owned  in  her  life,  the  only  thing  she  had  ever  made : 
her  work  and  creation;  its  roots  seemed  to  go  down 
into  her  heart;  and  she  could  not  feel  that  in  heaven 
there  would  be  old  white  roses  and  white  and  pur 
ple  pansies  and  mignonette  and  sweet  peas  that  one 
had  sown  one's  self  from  penny  packets. 

II 

AT  first,  when  Florrie  told  her,  the  verdict  had 
seemed  unescapable.  She  had  said,  after  the  little 
silence  in  which  she  received  it,  —  the  silence  in 
which  much  had  happened  to  her,  —  she  had  said, 
in  a  very  quiet  voice  that  had  surprised  herself, 
"I'm  afraid  it's  no  good,  then,  Florrie  dear.  I 
can't  afford  to  go  away." 

Aunt  Kate  had  left  her  only  the  house  and  its 
contents.  She  had  saved  only  the  tiniest  sum  her 
self  —  just  enough  to  yield  an  income  that  paid  for 
her  food  and  light  and  coal.  To  pay  for  Jane,  her 
good  old  servant,  to  pay  for  her  clothes  and  wash 
ing,  to  pay  for  the  trips  to  London  and  the  crum 
pets  and  cakes  that  she  gave  her  friends  at  tea  in 
Acacia  Road,  she  had  still  to  depend  upon  the 
pupils  that,  fortunately,  she  had  found  in  the  small 
Surrey  town.  On  three  afternoons  a  week  she 
sallied  forth,  peacefully  indeed,  with  no  sense  of 
anxiety  or  pressure,  and  made  her  way  to  the 
houses  of  the  doctor,  the  rector,  the  big  London 
manufacturer,  and  instructed  their  young  daugh 
ters  in  the  excellent  Munich  method  that  she  had 
imbibed  in  youth.  With  these  delightfully  con 
venient  strings  to  her  bow  she  could  manage  per- 


P4NSIES 

fectly.  But  to  give  them  up  and  to  pay  for  an 
open-air  cure  in  Switzerland  was  outside  the  bounds 
of  her  possibilities. 

So  she  explained,  in  the  quiet  voice,  to  Florrie; 
and  it  was  then  that  Florrie,  revealing  herself  as 'a 
more  wonderfully  kind  friend  than  even  in  Miss 
Glover's  grateful  eyes  she  had  always  been,  said, 
the  tears  suddenly  hopping  down  her  cheeks  and 
making  dark  spots  on  the  pink  silk  blouse, — 

"Stuff  and  nonsense,  my  dearest  Edie!  What  do 
a  few  pounds  more  or  less  matter  at  a  time  like 
this?  You  shall  go!  It's  a  question  of  life  or  death. 
Now,  not  a  word,  my  dear,  and  listen  to  me.  /'// 
send  you.  It'll  be  the  proudest  day  of  my  life  that 
sees  you  off.  What's  all  my  good  luck  worth  to  me 
if  I  can't  give  a  friend  a  helping  hand  when  she 
needs  it?  I  can  sell  out  some  investments.  I've 
more  than  enough,  and  I'll  soon  fill  my  stocking 
again.  And  you  shall  go  as  soon  as  we  can  get  you 
ready;  and  first  class,  my  dear,  all  the-  way,  boat 
and  train.  Don't  I  know  the  difference  it  makes  — 
and  getting  off  to  sleep  on  the  way?  Jane  shall  go 
with  you  to  take  care  of  you  —  oh,  yes,  she  shall! 
—  I  won't  hear  of  your  going  alone;  and  you'll 
come  back  next  spring  a  sound  woman. 

"I  know  all  about  those  Swiss  open-air  cures," 
Florrie  rushed  on.  "They're  magical.  Poor  Lady 
Forestalls  was  at  death's  door  three  years  ago  — 
there  she  is  —  over  there  on  the  piano  —  that  tall, 
regal-looking  woman  with  the  Pekinese:  worse  than 
you  she  was,  by  far.  And  she  went  to  Switzerland 
and  came  back  in  six  months'  time,  cured;  abso 
lutely  cured.  Never  a  touch  of  it  since.  She  does 
everything  and  goes  everywhere.  And  such  scenery, 
my  dear;  such  flowers!  You'll  revel  in  it.  And 

[  132  ] 


P4NSIES 

Julia  Forestalls  told  me  that  the  people  were  so 
interesting.  She  made  a  number  of  friends  — 
Italian,  German,  Russian.  You  shall  take  my 
tea-basket,  my  dear.  Jane  can  carry  it  easily.  It's 
a  gem;  everything  complete  and  so  convenient.  It 
makes  simply  all  the  difference  on  a  journey  if  you 
can  get  a  steaming  hot  cup  of  tea  at  any  time  you 
like,  day  or  night.  I  saved  Cora  Clement's  life  with 
my  tea-basket  in  Venice;  she  says  so  herself.  She 
got  chilled  to  the  bone  on  the  lagoons.  Over  there 
on  the  writing-bureau  she  is;  American.  Not  a 
beauty,  but  jolie  laide,  and  dresses  exquisitely  — 
as  you  can  see.  She's  always  taken  for  a  French 
woman." 

Miss  Glover,  even  more  than  usual,  felt  to-day 
that  dear  Florrie  dazed  and  bewildered  her  a  little; 
but  the  mere  fact  that  Florrie's  tears  had  dried  so 
soon,  that  she  could,  so  soon,  be  telling  her  about 
Lady  Forestalls  and  Cora  Clement,  was  encourag 
ing.  Miss  Glover  felt  that  her  case  was  evidently 
but  one  among  many  to  which  Florrie  had  seen  the 
happiest  endings  —  a  comparatively  unalarming 
affair;  entirely  unalarming,  though  exceedingly 
engrossing,  Florrie's  tone  and  demeanour  indicated, 
when  taken  in  hand  by  such  as  she. 

And  how  she  took  it  in  hand !  There  was  no  use 
protesting  against  anything.  As  always,  Florrie 
made  her  feel  that  she  knew  better  than  she  her 
self  could  what  was  good  for  her.  It  was  all  ar 
ranged  before  they  parted  that  day,  and  Florrie 
had  further  smoothed  her  path  by  declaring  that 
nothing  would  suit  her  better,  if  Edie  really  felt 
fussed  about  the  money,  than  to  take  The  Nook 
during  her  absence.  "The  very  thing  I  need," 
said  Florrie.  "I've  been  thinking  for  some  time 

1 133  ] 


PANSIES 

that  I  must  have  a  little  place  near  London  to  run 
down  to  for  week-ends.  And  you  Ve  that  duck  of  a 
spare-room,  too,  I  remember,  where  I  can  put  up 
a  friend;  and  it's  so  near  town  that  people  can 
motor  down  and  have  tea  with  me  of  an  afternoon. 
My  dear,  nothing  could  be  more  providential." 

During  the  three  weeks  that  followed,  Florrie,  in 
London,  shopped  for  her,  decided  on  the  clothes 
she  would  need  and  the  conveniences  that  she  must 
take;  and  interesting  parcels  arrived  at  The  Nook 
every  morning.  It  was  strange  and  exciting  to  be 
made  much  of,  strange  and  exciting  to  be  on  a 
journey;  she  had  not  been  out  of  England  since 
that  stay,  in  girlhood,  in  Munich;  and  in  spite  of 
the  shadow  hanging  over  her,  the  sense  of  haste  lest 
she  be  overtaken,  she  felt  the  days  of  preparation 
as  almost  happy  ones.  Jane,  it  was  true,  was  rather 
gloomy  about  everything,  but  even  beneath  her 
sombre  demeanour  Miss  Glover  felt  sure  that  she, 
too,  was  touched  by  the  sense  of  adventure,  for 
Jane  had  never  been  out  of  England  at  all. 

And  now  the  boxes  were  all  packed  and  Miss 
Glover's  dressing-case  stood  open,  half  filled,  in  her 
bedroom,  waiting  only  for  her  sponge  bag  and  pin- 
tray  and  brush  and  comb  to  be  added  next  morn 
ing,  when  she  and  Jane  and  Florrie  were  to  go  up 
together  to  Victoria,  and  Florrie  was  to  see  them 
off;  and  while  Jane  prepared  her  most  festive  tea, 
Miss  Glover  had  been  showing  Florrie  all  over  her 
new  domain  on  that  August  afternoon  when  she  had 
spoken  of  her  garden  as  horrid.  Florrie,  in  answer 
to  her  shy  request  that  she  might,  perhaps,  if  it 
was  n't  too  much  bother,  sow  some  mignonette  and 
sweet  peas  for  her  next  spring,  had  answered  with 
reassuring  decision,  "To  be  sure  I  will,  my  dear. 

[  134] 


P4NSIES 

I'll  take  care  of  everything  and  have  it  all  waiting 
for  you  spick  and  span  when  you  get  back."  And 
then  Jane's  gong  had  summoned  them  in,  and  it 
had  been  reassuring,  too,  to  see  how  benignant 
were  the  glances  that  Florrie  cast  about  the  little 
sitting-room  while  she  stirred  her  tea  and  com 
mended  Jane's  cakes.  "Beeswax  and  turpentine 
for  all  the  furniture  once  a  week.  /  know.  And 
dusted  every  morning  without  fail." 

Yes,  it  was  safe  in  Florrie's  competent  hands, 
dear  little  room.  In  her  heart  of  hearts,  though  she 
had  no  faintest  flicker  of  criticism  or  comparison 
except  for  that  one  strangely  painful  memory  of 
the  rush  of  pinkness,  —  Miss  Glover  very  much 
preferred  her  own  room,  shabby  and  simple  as  it 
was,  to  Florrie's;  just  as,  though  so  well  aware  of 
the  relative  insignificance  of  her  garden,  she  knew 
that  she  would  prefer  it  to  the  Isaacsons',  with  its 
arches  of  roses  and  its  geraniums  in  white  stone 
vases.  She  liked  quiet,  soft,  gentle  things;  the  ever- 
so-faded  ancient  chintzes  on  her  aunt's  chairs  and 
sofa,  showing  here  and  there  a  ghostly  bird  of 
paradise  or  a  knot  of  nearly  obliterated  flowers,  her 
aunt's  absurd,  faded,  old-fashioned  carpet,  — 
fortunately  faded !  —  and  her  grandmother's  Lowe- 
stoft  cups  ranged  above  the  mantelpiece.  Every 
thing  was  in  its  place;  her  knitting-basket  between 
her  chair  and  the  fireplace;  her  beaded  footstool 
before  the  best  armchair,  where  Florrie  sat;  the 
little  table,  with  a  bowl  of  white  and  purple  pansies 
on  it,  where  lay  the  daily  paper  and  the  two  books 
from  the  circulating  library.  All  were  dear  to  her; 
all  spoke  of  continuity  with  the  past,  of  long  as 
sociation,  of  quiet,  small,  peaceful  activities;  and 
as  she  looked  about  she  knew  that  her  heart  would 

1 135 1 


P4NSIES 

have  sunk  a  little  at  the  thought  of  leaving  them, 
had  it  not  been  for  Florrie's  sustaining  presence. 

Florrie,  while  her  second  cup  of  tea  was  being 
made,  drew  forth  and  laid  beside  the  tea-tray,  with 
an  air  of  infinite  sagacity,  the  coupons  for  the  re 
served  seats  in  the  first-class  carriage.  "  / '//  keep  my 
eyes  on  those,"  said  Florrie.  It  was  almost  as  if  they 
had  been  tickets  for  some  brilliant  entertainment  — 
as  if,  Miss  Glover  felt,  she  and  Jane  were  going  to 
be  taken  to  the  opera  rather  than  to  Switzerland. 
It  was  owing  to  Florrie  that  she  had  almost  come 
to  feel  that  Switzerland  was  the  opera. 

But  that  night,  when  they  had  gone  upstairs  and 
the  house  was  still,  the  sense  of  adventure  deserted 
her.  Sitting  in  her  dressing-gown  before  her  mirror 
while,  with  hands  that  tired  so  easily,  she  brushed 
and  braided  her  hair,  she  felt,  suddenly,  very  mid 
dle-aged,  very  lonely,  ill,  and  almost  frightened. 
The  look  of  her  gaping  dressing-case,  as  she  glanced 
round  at  it,  was  frightening,  as  was  the  emptiness 
of  the  mantelpiece,  from  which  the  family  photo 
graphs  had  all  been  taken  to  be  packed,  together 
with  the  Bible  and  prayer-book  from  the  table 
near  her  bed.  It  was  a  room  already  deserted.  It 
looked  as  it  might  look  if  she  had  died.  What,  in 
deed,  in  spite  of  Florre's  good  cheer,  if  she  were 
to  die  out  there,  alone,  away  from  everything  and 
every  one  she  knew?  And,  with  a  curious  impulse, 
rising  to  go  and  close  the  gaping  dressing-case,  she 
realized  that  she  had  not  said  good-bye  to  any 
thing.  The  morning  had  all  been  spent  in  packing 
—  in  that  and  in  preparations  for  Florrie's  arrival; 
and  all  the  afternoon  Florrie  had  been  with  her, 
and  she  was  to  be  with  her  till  her  departure  to 
morrow.  She  would  not  again  be  alone  in  her  little 

[136] 


PANSIES 

house;  she  would  not  again  be  alone  in  her  garden. 
The  thought  of  her  pansies  came  with  a  pang  of 
reproach;  it  was  as  if  she  had  forgotten  them,  like 
children  sent  to  bed  without  a  good-night  kiss. 

She  drew  her  curtain  and  looked  out.  Yes;  there 
they  were.  The  moon  was  shining  brightly  and  the 
white  pansies  lay  below  like  pools  of  milk  upon  the 
ground.  She  looked  at  them  for  some  moments, 
while  the  soft  fragrance  of  the  night  mounted  to  her 
and  seemed  with  gently  supplicating  hands  to 
draw  her  forth;  and  then,  cautiously  —  for  Florrie 
slept  across  the  way  —  but  with  decision,  she  put 
on  her  heavy  cloak  over  her  dressing-gown, 
wrapped  a  shawl  about  her  head  and  shoulders,  and 
stole  downstairs. 

The  drawing-room  was  very  dark;  she  felt  her 
way  swiftly  through  it  past  the  familiar  objects, 
and  the  conservatory  door  opened  on  a  flood  of 
silvery  light.  She  saw  the  high,  shining  disk  of  the 
moon,  and  the  great  black  poplar  tree  that  grew 
in  the  neighbouring  garden  seemed  vast  against  the 
sky.  As  she  stepped  out,  she  made  herself  think  of 
Diamond  in  "At  the  Back  of  the  North  Wind." 
It  was  like  stepping  into  a  fairy-tale;  only  some 
thing  more  sweet  and  solemn  than  a  fairy-tale,  as 
that  book  was;  something,  for  all  its  beauty,  a 
little  awful.  But  when  she  looked  down  from  the 
moon,  the  sky,  the  poplar,  there  was  only  sweetness. 
The  fragrance  that  had  solicited  her  seemed  now 
to  welcome  her,  to  clasp  and  caress  her.  The 
pansies  were  all  looking  up  at  her.  On  the  wall 
Madame  Alfred  Carriere  was  more  beautiful  than 
she  had  ever  before  seen  her,  her  pale  flowers  and 
buds  making  a  constellation  against  the  darkness. 

She  walked  round  the  path,  looking  at  it  all,  so 

1 137 1 


P4NSIES 

glad  that  she  had  come,  smiling  —  a  child  in  fairy 
land,  or  a  spirit  arrived  in  Paradise  and  finding 
it  strange  yet  familiar  —  as  Paradise  should  be. 
Perhaps,  she  thought,  dying  would  be  like  that:  a 
stepping  out  from  the  darkness  into  something  vast 
and  solemn  that  would  slowly  gather  about  one 
into  well-known  and  transfigured  shapes,  into  white 
pansies  growing  thickly  at  one's  feet.  She  stooped 
in  the  moonlight  and  passed  her  hands  over  their 
upturned  faces.  They  were  flowers  entranced, 
neither  sleeping  nor  awake;  and  she  felt,  as  her 
fingers  touched  their  soft,  dewy  petals,  as  if  their 
dreams  with  their  whiteness  flowed  into  her.  To 
leave  them  was  like  leaving  her  very  self,  yet 
the  parting  now  was  all  peace  and  innocent  ac 
quiescence,  like  them,  and  she  was  still  smiling  as 
she  whispered  to  them,  "  Good-bye,  darlings." 

Ill 

SWITZERLAND  was  like  the  opera,  and  for  her  first 
months  there  Miss  Glover  felt  as  if  she  watched  it 
from  a  box  —  very  much  at  the  back  and  looking 
past  many  heads  at  the  vast  display.  Everything 
that  Florrie  had  said  was  true:  the  scenery  was 
more  magnificent  than  she  could  have  imagined, 
oppressively  more,  and  the  people,  again  oppres 
sively,  more  interesting.  They  were,  these  people, 
engaged  all  of  them  in  trying  to  keep  alive,  and, 
when  they  failed  in  that,  in  dying,  dying  under 
one's  eyes  from  day  to  day;  and  in  the  publicity 
of  such  occupations  there  was  something  as  abnor 
mal  as  was  the  size  of  the  mountains.  Some  of  these 
people  she  came  to  know  a  little  —  those,  usually, 
who  had  given  up:  the  dear  little  Russian  girl  who, 


PANSIES 

alas,  died  in  December;  the  sulky,  affectionate 
French  boy;  and  the  large  yet  wasted  German 
singer  who  made  Miss  Glover  think  of  a  splendid 
fruit  keeping  still  its  shell  of  form  and  colour  while 
eaten  away  inside  by  wasps.  Fraiilein  Schmidt 
liked  to  have  her  play  Schubert  and  Schumann 
songs  to  her,  and  still  tried  to  sing  attainable  pas 
sages  here  and  there  in  a  queer,  booming,  hollow 
voice  that  made  Miss  Glover,  again,  think  of  the 
wasps  imprisoned  and  buzzing.  But  most  of  the 
people  remained  parts  of  the  spectacle  to  her. 
They  engaged,  when  they  were  well  enough,  in 
winter  sports;  they  talked  together  of  books  she 
had  never  heard  of,  and  of  things  she  had  never 
thought  of;  and  often,  moreover,  she  could  not 
understand  what  they  said,  as  her  languages  did 
not  extend  beyond  rather  simple  French  and  Ger 
man,  and  Dante  with  a  dictionary. 

The  only  other  English  person  there  was  a  young 
man  who  made  her  think  of  the  Prince  Charlie 
roses ;  he  was  sombre  and  delicate  and  beautiful  and 
did  not  talk  to  anybody,  sitting  apart  and  reading 
all  day  long.  Miss  Glover  wondered  a  good  deal 
about  him,  and  watched  him  sometimes  from  her 
place  on  the  snow-sifted  balcony  when  they  lay 
there  encased  in  fur  bags  and  buttressed  with  hot- 
water  bottles.  His  name  was  Lord  Ninian  Car- 
stairs;  and  that  was  like  the  roses,  too. 

Once,  when  they  were  alone  on  the  balcony,  their 
recumbent  chairs  near  one  another,  he  lifted  his 
eyes  suddenly  and  found  hers  fixed  upon  him,  and 
perhaps  their  wistful  and  ingenuous  absorption 
touched  him,  for,  flushing  faintly,  —  he  was  a  shy 
young  man,  —  he  asked  if  she  were  feeling  better. 

She  said  she  could  n't  quite  tell.   It  was  difficult 

[  w] 


P4NSIES 

to  tell  what  one  felt,  did  n't  he  find?  Everything 
was  so  different;  so  exciting  in  a  way;  and  when  one 
was  excited  one  felt,  perhaps,  better  than  one  was. 

Lord  Ninian  laughed  shortly  at  that,  and  said 
that  he  did  n't  feel  excited;  he  wished  he  could. 

"I'm  depressed,  too,  sometimes,"  said  Miss 
Glover;  and  then  he  sighed. 

"One  gets  so  abominably  homesick  in  this  hole," 
he  said. 

She  had  never  thought  of  such  splendour  as 
being,  possibly,  to  anybody,  a  hole;  but  she  knew 
what  it  was  to  feel  homesick.  They  smiled  at  each 
other  when  they  met  after  that,  she  and  Lord 
Ninian,  and  he  lent  her  magazines  and  books. 
When  she  heard  that  he  had  died,  —  she  had  not 
seen  him  for  a  week  and  had  feared  for  him,  — 
she  felt  very,  very  sad  and  her  thoughts  turned  in 
great  longing  to  Acacia  Road  and  to  her  garden. 

She  wanted  very  much  to  live  to  see  her  garden 
again;  but  she  could  not  help  being  frightened  lest 
she  should  not;  for,  as  the  winter  wore  on,  it  be 
came  evident  to  her,  and  all  the  more  because  every 
one  else  was  so  carefully  unaware  of  it,  that  one  of 
the  things  that  Florrie  had  predicted  was  not  to 
come  true.  She  was  not  to  return  cured.  She  was 
not  going  to  get  better.  At  first  the  slow  burning 
of  fever  had  seemed  only  part  of  the  excitement,  but 
she  could  not  go  on  thinking  it  that  when  it  began 
to  leave  her  breathless,  trembling,  faint.  By  the 
time  that  the  miracle  of  the  Alpine  flower-meadows 
was  revealed  to  her  and  she  had  watched  the  snow 
recede  and  the  jonquils  and  anemones  advance, 
she  knew  that  if  she  wished  to  die  at  home  she  must 
soon  go.  They  would  not  consent  to  that  at  once. 
They  said  that  the  spring  months  were  full  of 


P4NSIES 

magic,  and  she  was  persuaded  to  stay  on.  They 
were  magically  beautiful  and  she  was  glad  to  see 
them,  but  she  longed  more  and  more  to  see  her 
little  garden.  She  dreamed  sometimes  of  her  pan- 
sies  at  night,  and  it  seemed  to  her  once  that  as  she 
stooped  in  the  moonlight  and  touched  them  she  was 
cured;  the  fever  fell  from  her;  a  cool  white  peace 
flowed  into  her  veins;  and  when  she  looked  up  from 
them,  the  night  was  gone  and  the  sun  was  rising 
over  her  Surrey  hills. 

At  the  beginning  of  June  they  consented  that  she 
should  go.  They  did  not  tell  her  the  truth,  of 
course.  They  said  that  she  might  pass  the  summer 
in  England,  since  she  wished  so  much  to  return 
there,  and  that  she  must  come  back  for  next  win 
ter;  but  she  knew  that  if  her  state  had  not  been 
recognized  as  hopeless  they  would  not  have  let  her 
go.  It  was  hopeless,  and  she  summoned  all  her 
strength  and  resolution,  that  she  might  live  until 
she  reached  Acacia  Road. 

IV 

FLORRIE  met  her  at  Victoria.  Florrie  did  not  know 
that  it  was  hopeless,  though  she  knew  that  it  was 
not  as  yet,  a  cure;  but  from  the  way  that  she  con 
trolled  her  features  to  a  determined  joviality  Miss 
Glover  could  infer  her  shock,  her  grief,  her  conster 
nation.  The  glance,  too,  that  Jane  and  Florrie 
exchanged  was  revealing,  had  she  been  in  need  of 
revelations. 

After  a  night  in  Florrie's  flat,  however,  she  knew 
that  she  looked  so  much  better  that  poor  Florrie, 
when  she  came  to  see  her  in  the  morning,  was 
quite  erroneously  cheered.  "You're  all  right," 


PANSIES 

Florrie  declared.  "The  journey's  knocked  you 
about  a  bit;  but  once  we  get  you  down  to  Surrey, 
Jane  and  I,  you'll  pick  up  in  no  time.  After  all, 
there's  no  place  like  home,  is  there?" 

Miss  Glover,  from  her  pillows,  smiled.  She  felt 
very  fond  of  kind  Florrie  and  sorry  for  her  that  she 
must,  so  soon,  surfer  sadness  on  her  account. 

It  was  difficult,  in  the  train,  to  listen  to  Florrie's 
talk.  After  her  fright  of  the  day  before,  Florrie 
had  cheered  up  so  tremendously  that  she  talked 
even  more  than  usual,  of  her  friends,  her  enterprises, 
of  how  she  was  going  yachting  that  autumn  with 
the  Forestalls,  and  of  how  Di  Haymouth  had  just 
had  a  baby. 

"  A  splendid  boy,  and  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Isaacson  are 
fairly  off  their  heads  with  pride  and  pleasure.  Such 
a  layette,  my  dear,  you  never  saw!  Real  lace 
through  and  through  —  and  the  cradle  of  a  regular 
little  prince!  I  gave  him  a  silver  porringer  for  his 
christening;  a  lovely  thing,  all  heavy  repousse 
work  with  his  initials  on  a  shield  at  one  side.  Di 
say  it's  the  prettiest  porringer  she  ever  saw." 

It  was  difficult  to  listen  to  Florrie  and  to  nod  and 
smile  at  the  right  moment  when  she  was  thinking  of 
her  garden  and  wondering  if  Florrie  had  really 
remembered  to  sow  the  sweet  peas  and  mignonette. 
Even  if  she  had  n't,  the  Madame  Alfred  Carriere 
and  the  Prince  Charlie  roses  would  be  out,  and  the 
last  tulips,  and  the  pansies,  of  course.  And  it  was 
such  a  beautiful  day,  just  such  a  day  as  that  she 
had  risen  to  look  at  when,  in  her  dream,  the  pan 
sies  had  cured  her. 

The  drive  from  the  station  up  to  Acacia  Road 
was  a  short  one.  The  dear,  foolish  little  porch  was 
there,  the  bow-window,  the  laurel-bushes.  Her 


PANSIES 

own  home.  As  she  saw  it  she  felt  such  a  lift  of  the 
heart  that  it  seemed  to  her,  too,  that  she  might  be 
going  to  get  better  after  all.  Florrie  and  Jane 
helped  her  out  and  she  and  Florrie  went  into  the 
sitting-room.  She  looked  round  it,  smiling,  while 
she  felt  her  happy,  fluttering  breaths  like  those  of 
some  wandering  bird  put  back  into  its  own  dear 
cage  again,  safe,  secure,  bewildered  a  little  in  its 
contentment.  She  was  like  such  a  trivial  little 
cage-bird;  she  was  meant  for  Acacia  Road,  and  not 
for  Swiss  mountains. 

Everything  was  the  same:  even  her  knitting- 
basket  stood  waiting  for  her,  and  all  that  caught 
her  eye  with  their  unfamiliarity  were  the  flowers,  the 
profusion  of  flowers,  standing  in  bowls  and  vases 
everywhere;  perhaps  almost  too  many  flowers,  — 
that  was  like  dear,  exuberant  Florrie,  —  and  all 
pink. 

"Oh  —  how  lovely  they  are!"  she  said,  finding 
the  fluttering  breath  fail  her  a  little.  "  How  dear  of 
you,  Florrie,  to  have  it  all  arranged  like  this!" 

"They  look  welcoming,  don't  they?"  said  Flor 
rie,  who  laughed  with  some  excitement.  "Will  you 
rest,  dear,  or  come  into  the  garden?" 

"Oh,  the  garden,  please.  I'm  not  at  all  tired.  I 
can  rest  later." 

Florrie  still  led  her  by  the  arm.  They  went  into 
the  conservatory  and  there  came  to  her  then  the 
strangest,  dizziest  sense  of  pink  —  everywhere 
pink!  —  shining  in  at  her  through  the  sea-green 
glass,  bursting  in  at  her  through  the  open  door." 

For  a  moment  she  thought  that  her  mind  was 
disordered,  and  looked  up  with  large,  startled  eyes 
at  Florrie;  but,  beaming  as  she  had  never  yet  seen 
her  beam,  all  complacency  and  triumphant  benevo- 


P4NSIES 

lence,  Florrie  nodded,  saying,  "Now  for  your  sur 
prise,  my  dear.  Now  for  your  garden.  Just  see 
what  I've  made  of  it  to  welcome  you!" 

They  stepped  out.  Pink.  Pink  everywhere, 
above,  below,  around  one.  The  paths  were  arched 
with  swinging  iron  chains  on  which,  already,  the 
long  festoons  advanced.  The  border,  heaping  itself 
up  splendidly  against  the  wall,  was  splashed  with 
white,  yellow,  blue  and  purple,  a  blaze  of  colour  in 
deed,  but  pink  dominated,  like  the  sound  of  trump 
ets  in  an  orchestra.  It  also  made  Miss  Glover 
think,  strangely,  sickly,  of  the  sound  of  a  gramo 
phone.  There  was  no  lawn.  The  centre  of  the  gar 
den  was  flagged,  with  a  highly  ornamental  sun-dial 
in  the  middle  and  a  white  garden  seat  and  a  wonder 
ful  white  stone  basin  for  the  birds.  There  were  no 
Prince  Charlie  roses,  no  mignonette  and  sweet 
peas,  there  were  no  pansies.  Her  garden  had 
disappeared. 

"There!"  said  Florrie. 

She  led  her  to  the  garden  seat.  From  here  Miss 
Glover,  as  she  sank  down  upon  it,  could  see  that 
the  back  of  the  house  was  also  dappled  with  the 
incessant  colour. 

"Isn't  it  a  marvel!"  said  Florrie.  "I  hardly 
dared  hope  they'd  grow  as  they  have,  but  Dorothy 
Perkins  is  a  winner,  and  these  latest  climbers  run 
her  close.  I  spared  nothing,  my  dear,  nothing  — 
manure,  bone-meal,  labour.  The  men  were  working 
here  for  a  week  last  autumn.  All  the  old  soil  was 
carted  away  and  a  rich  loam  put  in  three  feet  deep. 
I  put  them  in  big.  I  knew  I  could  get  them  to  take 
if  I  took  enough  pains  over  it.  Those  chains  will 
be  covered  in  another  month.  I  knew  it  would  do 
you  more  good  than  any  open-air  cure  to  find  such 

[  H4  ] 


P4NSIES 

a  garden  waiting  for  you.  I  'd  defy  anybody  to  have 
the  blues  in  this  garden!  In  its  little  way  it's  just 
an  epitome  of  joy,  is  n't  it?  It's  done  me  good,  to 
begin  with!  I've  been  having  tea  out  here  every 
day  in  my  week-ends  and  every  one  who's  seen  it 
and  heard  about  my  plan  says  I  'm  a  regular  old 
fairy  with  a  wand.  Mrs.  Isaacson  motored  down 
only  last  Saturday  and  thought  it  was  a  perfect 
poem.  And  so  it  is,  though  I  say  it  as  should  n't." 

Florrie  had  paused  on  the  deepest  breath  of 
purest  satisfaction,  and  the  time  had  come  when 
Miss  Glover  must  speak.  She  must  find  words  to 
express  gratitude  and  astonishment.  She  must 
not  burst  into  tears.  She  felt  that  if  she  began  to 
cry  she  would  at  once  be  very  ill.  She  did  not  want 
to  be  taken  ill  before  dear,  good,  kind  Florrie. 
And  it  was,  of  course,  a  beautiful  garden;  far  more 
beautiful  than  hers  had  ever  been,  no  doubt;  yet 
it  hurt  her  so  —  to  find  her  garden  gone  —  that 
she  heard  her  voice  come  in  gasps  as  she  said, 
"Dear  Florrie  —  you  are  a  wonderful  friend  — 
you  are  indeed.  —  I  can  never  thank  you  enough. 
It's  a  miracle." 

Florrie  patted  her  shoulder  —  she  had  her  arm 
around  her  shoulders.  "My  best  thanks  will  be  to 
see  you  happy  in  it,  Edie  dear,  and  getting  well  and 
strong  again  in  it.  It's  a  regular  surprise-packet, 
this  garden,  let  me  tell  you,  my  dear.  It'll  go  on, 
that  border,  right  up  till  November,  one  thing  after 
another:  I  thought  it  all  out,  pencil  and  paper  and 
catalogue  in  hand.  I  went  over  the  whole  colour- 
scheme  with  Mrs.  Isaacson  —  there's  no  one  who 
knows  more  about  it.  And  since  most  of  the  her 
baceous  things  came  from  her  garden,  it  did  n't 
cost  as  much  as  you'd  think.  They've  always 

1 145] 


P4NSIES 

heaps  of  plants  left  over  when  they  divide  in 
autumn,  and  everything  was  at  my  disposal;  and 
all  the  latest  varieties,  as  I  need  n't  say.  Wait  till 
you  see  the  lilies  —  yes,  my  dear,  I  Ve  found  room 
for  everything;  where  there's  a  will  there's  a  way 
is  my  motto,  you  know  —  and  the  phloxes  and  the 
chrysanthemums." 

She  would  never  see  them,  though  she  was  sure 
that  they  would  all  be  very  beautiful;  she  would 
never  see  these  latest  varieties  from  Mrs.  Isaac 
son's  garden.  And  she  would  never  see  her  own 
little  garden  again.  How  wonderfully  fortunate  it 
was  —  the  thought  went  through  her  mind  con 
fusedly  as  .she  sat  there,  feeling  herself  droop 
against  Florrie's  shoulder  —  that  she  was  not  to 
live  with  Florrie's  and  to  go  on  missing  her  own 
garden.  How  fortunate— but  her  thoughts  swam 
more  and  more  and  tears  dazed  her  eyes  —  that 
she  had  not  to  say  good-bye  twice  to  her  pansies. 
She  had  died,  then,  really,  —  that  was  it,  —  on 
the  moonlight  night  when  she  had  last  seen  them. 
And  she  had  left  the  house  to  Florrie,  dear  kind 
Florrie,  and  Florrie  would  go  on  having  tea  happily 
under  the  festoons  of  roses. 


PINK  FOXGLOVES 


>HEY  were  only  beginning  to 
revert.  Last  summer  they  had 
stood,  spires  of  fretted  snow 
tapering  at  the  points  to 
jade-coloured  buds,  at  the 
edge  of  the  little  copse  where 
the  garden  path  lost  itself 
among  young  larches,  birches, 
hazels,  and  poplars,  black  and  white.  The  sun 
set  behind  the  copse,  spreading  in  the  summer  eve 
nings  a  pale  gold  background,  and  often  when  he 
went  to  look  at  his  foxgloves  and  to  listen  to  the 
lonely  song  of  the  willow-wren,  rippling,  like  a  tiny 
rill  of  water,  from  the  heart  of  the  wood,  Aubrey 
Westmacott  had  felt  that  there  was  something 
almost  dangerous  in  such  bliss  as  this.  To  breathe 
this  limpid  air,  to  hear  the  willow-wren,  to  look  at 
white  foxgloves,  and  to  know  himself  free  forever 
from  the  long  oppression  of  London  —  if  he  could 
have  sung  his  wistful  gratitude,  his  melancholy 
joy,  the  song  might  have  been  like  the  bird's. 

This  year  the  change  in  the  foxgloves  had  come 
as  a  complete  surprise;  he  was  still  a  novice  at 
gardening.  He  had  left  his  beloved  garden  for  a 
week;  regretfully,  for  he  could  not  bear  to  lose  a 
day  of  it  —  he  was  like  a  lover  with  a  bride,  long 
pined  for,  who  each  day  grows  dearer  and  lovelier; 


PINK  FOXGLOFES 

but  he  had  gone,  because  it  seemed  churlish  to 
refuse  the  old  don  friend  at  Cambridge  —  and 
when  he  returned,  at  evening,  and  had  walked 
down  to  the  copse  and  had  seen  them  standing 
there,  so  delicately  yet  so  decisively  altered,  the 
shock  of  the  surprise  had  seemed  all  delight.  He 
had  intended  white  foxgloves  to  rise,  always,  against 
the  copse;  but  then  he  had  not  known  how  lovely 
pink  foxgloves  could  be.  He  had  never  seen  them 
of  such  a  shade,  each  bell  of  palest  rose  brimmed 
with  shadows  of  mauve,  and  finely  freaked  within. 
Regiments  of  the  white  flowers  had  remained 
steadfast,  so  that  there  could  be  no  sense  of  loss, 
and  he  had  picked  an  armful  of  the  pink  ones  and 
carried  them  back  to  the  house,  feeling,  as  he 
looked  at  them  against  his  shoulder,  that  he  would 
have  liked  to  kiss  them.  He  spent  the  remaining 
hours  of  dusk  in  arranging  them.  He  never  al 
lowed  the  parlourmaid  to  arrange  the  flowers.  That 
she  saw  him,  tolerantly,  if  with  a  flavour  of  irony, 
as  a  very  eccentric  gentleman,  he  was  aware,  just 
as  he  was  aware,  quite  cheerfully,  that  many  of 
his  kind  neighbours  found  him  a  rather  absurd  one. 
But  one  of  the  deepest  joys  this  new  life  afforded 
him,  after  the  paternal  bliss  of  seeing  the  darlings 
grow,  was  in  disposing  them  about  the  rooms,  with 
a  loving  discrimination  that  Ridley's  skilled  but 
cold  and  conventional  hands  could  never  have 
accomplished. 

This  evening  he  put  the  foxgloves  in  the  drawing- 
room,  a  tall  jar  on  the  bureau,  a  taller  jar  on  the 
piano,  and  a  group  in  the  vast  white  Chinese  bowl, 
wedged  cunningly  into  place  with  stones  among 
the  stems.  Here  he  could  look  at  them  next  morn 
ing  as  he  worked  at  his  history.  He  always  worked 

[  148  ] 


PINK  FOXGLOVES 

in  the  drawing-room,  for  there  he  had  the  morning 
sun,  and,  if  he  could  not  see  his  massed  and  tiered 
herbaceous  border,  could  look  out  at  the  cherry 
tree  and  at  the  tiny  squares  of  terraced  lawns, 
dropping  from  level  to  level,  with  their  stone  steps 
and  low  stone  walls  and  narrow  jewelled  bordering 
of  flowers. 

There  was  a  very  nice  little  study  behind  the 
dining-room  —  it  was  from  the  dining-room  that 
one  saw  the  herbaceous  border,  and  he  could 
meditate  future  rearrangements  and  harmonies 
while  he  ate  his  breakfast  —  but  the  study  looked 
out  on  the  stable  shrubberies.  He  liked,  too,  to 
feel  himself  encompassed  by  his  treasures,  old  and 
new,  while  he  wrote  of  mediaeval  customs;  his 
mother's  incompetent  but  loveable  water-colours, 
sketches  of  her  old  home,  the  grey,  ancient,  gabled 
house  among  just  such  Cotswold  slopes  and  uplands 
as  his  western  windows  looked  out  upon,  though 
his  mother's  old  home,  passed  long  since  to  alien 
hands,  lay  on  the  other  side  of  the  county;  and  his 
father's  seafaring  trophies,  from  China  and  Japan 
and  far  Pacific  islands,  and  all  the  lately  acquired 
delightful  solidities  of  Jacobean  oak,  and  his 
maturest  choice  in  printed  linen.  Here,  on  their 
background  of  mullioned  window  or  dark  wainscot 
ing  —  such  a  gem  of  a  little  Jacobean  house  it  was 
—  the  pink  foxgloves  greeted  him  next  morning, 
set  among  feathery  heads  and  sharp  green  spears 
of  meadow  grass,  glimmering  and  poised  on  tiptoe, 
like  groups  of  softly  blushing  nymphs,  and  he 
stood  for  a  long  time  looking  at  them,  his  hands 
clasped  behind  his  back. 

He  was  forty-six,  a  fragile  little  man,  blanched 
and  stooping  from  the  long  years  of  imprisonment  in 

[  H9  ] 


PINK  FOXGLOFES 

the  Government  office,  from  which  the  undreamed 
of  inheritance  had  released  him  only  three  years 
ago,  with  faded  gold  hair  hanging  across  his  fore 
head  and  a  gentle  face  of  stifled  dreams,  the  mouth 
slightly  puckering  as  if  in  intentness  on  some  task. 
The  eyes,  of  a  dim  yet  dense  pastel  blue  that  told 
darkly  in  his  faded  face,  were  intent,  too,  but  not 
acute;  they  dwelt;  they  did  not  penetrate.  He  wore 
a  small,  short  moustache,  and  a  pair  of  gold  pince- 
nez  dangled  at  his  coat  button. 

Delicate  as  he  had  always  been,  and  ineffectual, 
as  he  had  always  so  dejectedly  been  aware  of  being, 
he,  too,  with  all  his  relatives,  had  thought  it  very 
fortunate  when,  on  leaving  the  university,  he  had 
secured  the  tiny  post  in  the  Civil  Service.  There, 
he  knew,  he  would  stay;  he  was  not  of  the  type  that 
rises,  and  he  had  never  during  the  long  years  that 
followed  rebelled  consciously  against  his  fate.  He 
was,  he  often  told  himself  reproachfully,  so  very 
fortunate  compared  with  men  far  abler  and  more 
deserving  than  himself.  He  found  that  he  could 
not  write,  as  he  had  hoped  to  do,  after  the  con 
scientious  hours  at  the  office.  He  read  a  great  deal, 
and  crept  away  to  the  country  for  every  week-end, 
sitting  by  meadow  or  river,  like  a  dusty  mouse  let 
loose  from  its  trap  and  softly  panting  in  the  sun 
light.  He  was  often  ill,  and  the  doctors  always  rec 
ommended  a  country  life,  but  it  was  not  on  hy 
gienic  grounds  that  he  pined  for  limpid  spaces  and 
starry  solitudes.  There  was  a  soft  passion  in  his 
blood,  inherited  from  the  mother  whom  he  so  much 
resembled,  for  the  sights  and  sounds  and  occupa 
tions  of  rurality.  He  adored  flowers.  He  often 
dreamed  of  them  at  night,  and  in  waking  hours  the 
thought  of  a  garden  of  his  own  haunted  him.  Some- 

[  150] 


PINK  FOXGL07ES 

times  he  went  to  stay  with  friends  in  their  gardens; 
but  this  was  an  ambiguous  joy;  it  was  like  seeing 
the  pink  and  white  babies  playing  about  their 
nurses  and  perambulators  in  the  Flower  Walk  in 
Kensington  Gardens,  and  having  no  claim  to  kiss 
any  of  them.  He  loved  children,  too. 

And  now  he  found  himself  transplanted  to  this 
wonderful  fairy  tale  by  Uncle  Percy's  legacy.  He 
still,  often,  could  hardly  realize  it.  There  was  a 
haze  of  dizzy  delight  over  all  the  memory  of  the 
last  three  years;  the  search  for  a  house,  the  securing 
of  Meadows,  the  furnishing  and  ordering  of  his 
household  —  he  who  had  lived  in  rooms  in  Ken 
sington  for  twenty-four  years,  ruled  over  by  a 
flawlessly  honest  but  relentless  landlady!  To  think 
that  he  could  have  other  fish  for  breakfast  than 
finnan  haddock,  and  other  vegetables  in  winter 
than  cabbage!  This  was  a  minor  but  an  emphatic 
pleasure. 

But  above  all,  around  all,  the  garden!  He  had 
planned  and  planted  it  all,  studying  books,  brood 
ing  over  catalogues,  making  lists,  writing  labels  ever 
so  neatly.  The  vegetables  were  given  over  to  the 
gardener;  but  his  flowers,  except  for  deep  trenching 
—  and  oh,  how  deep,  how  rich,  he  saw  to  it  that 
it  was!  he  tended  single-handed.  His  seed-boxes, 
his  cold-frames,  his  tools  and  baskets,  how  he 
adored  them  all,  and  how  happy  he  was  in  any 
small  personal  economies,  so  that  extravagance  in 
manure  and  bone-meal  and  leaf-mould  should  be 
well  justified.  The  history  of  mediaeval  customs 
was  also  a  long-cherished  ideal,  but  it  remained  of 
secondary  interest;  his  heart,  always,  was  in  the 
garden,  meditating  mulchings,  waterings,  or  hoe- 
ings.  Every  dream  had  come  true,  had  more  than 


PINK  FOXGLOFES 

realized  itself.  Was  it  any  wonder  that  he  should 
feel  himself  going  softly  in  his  amazed  gratitude, 
should  sometimes,  as  when  he  listened  to  the  wil 
low-wren  at  evening,  feel  that  such  happiness  was 
dangerous. 

It  had  not  seemed  to  flaw  the  happiness,  it  had 
seemed  but  to  add  a  sweeter  undertone  to  it, 
melancholy  yet  blissful,  that  into  the  new  Paradise 
there  should  have  stolen  a  new  longing,  and  that,  as 
of  old,  he  should  find  himself  haunted  by  an  un 
attainable  loveliness.  He  thought  of  this  as  he 
looked  at  the  pink  foxgloves,  for  they  made  him 
think  of  the  face  of  Leila  Pickering.  "Yes,  yes, 
yes,"  he  said  to  himself,  as  he  turned  to  the  medi 
aeval  history,  for  he  had  the  habit,  caught  from 
his  long  loneliness,  of  speaking  much  to  himself  and 
with  a  quaint  repetition  of  words  that  stole  into 
his  social  speech,  "it  is  she  they  are  like;  she  they 
are  like.  Lovely,,  lovely,  like  her." 

Later  in  the  morning,  privileged  as  she  .was  to 
interrupt  even  the  history,  it  was  Mrs.  Pomf  rey  who 
informed  him  that  the  strange,  delicate  beauty  was 
transitory,  an  unfixed  type,  and  that,  next  year,  or 
in  a  very  few  years,  the  palely  rosy  nymphs  would 
be  purple. 

"They'll  revert.  You  can  get  pink  ones,  you 
know,  from  the  seedsmen;  rosy  carmine  they  call 
it;  but  not  at  all  this  colour.  I've  never  seen  a 
colour  quite  like  this.  Your  soil  must  do  it.  I've 
always  thought  the  soil  of  Meadows  had  magic 
in  it." 

Mrs.  Pomfrey  was  the  late  rector's  widow,  and 
lived  in  a  thicket  of  roses  half  a  mile  away  in  the 
village.  She  was  tall,  black-robed,  majestic,  and 
melancholy,  with  a  deep  voice  and  black  eyes  and  a 

1 152 1 


PINK  FOXGLOVES 

high,  hooked  nose  and  large  false  teeth  that  shifted 
slightly  and  slightly  clashed  together  when  she 
spoke.  She  had  survived  all  emotions  except  the 
grief  of  having  to  grow  her  roses  on  a  clayless  soil, 
and  to  this  grief  she  often  returned.  A  girlhood 
friend  of  Aubrey  Westmacott's  mother,  she  had 
been  his  link  with  Windbury.  His  week-ends  with 
her  there  had  been  the  very  comets  of  his  dark 
London  sky,  and  for  years  he  had  seen  Meadows 
inadequately  tenanted,  with  an  eye  of  brooding 
love. 

"Oh!  they'll  revert  to  purple,  then,"  he  said, 
somewhat  distressed;  and  he  repeated  "purple, 
purple,"  several  times,  as  if  to  familiarize  himself 
with  the  sound  and  very  sight  of  it,  while  Mrs. 
Pomfrey  answered  him,  "Give  'em  time  and  they'll 
all  revert.  You  must  dig  'em  up  and  sow  again  from 
year  to  year  if  you  want  to  keep  'em  pure." 

"Not  that  I  don't  care  very  much  for  the  purple 
ones,"  said  Aubrey;  "they  are  most  beautiful 
flowers-,  most  beautiful;  but  it's  wild  in  woods,  that 
I  like  best  to  see  them.  It  will  be  a  business  to  re 
plant;  dear  me!  It  took  me  a  day  of  hard  work  to 
establish  my  white  ones  in  that  haphazard-looking 
little  colony  down  there." 

"Gardening  is  all  hard  work,"  said  Mrs.  Pom 
frey,  "and  all  disappointment,  for  the  most  part, 
too.  It's  only  the  things  you  did  n't  expect  to 
succeed  that  ever  do,  and  any  effect  you  particu 
larly  count  on  is  pretty  sure  to  fail  you."  She 
tempered  her  grimness  by  a  slight,  bleak  smile, 
however,  for  she  and  Aubrey  Westmacott  under 
stood  each  other  and  had  the  gardener's  soul,  for 
which  no  work  is  too  hard  and  no  disappointments 
too  many. 

[153] 


PINK  FOXGLOVES 

"  It  will  be  very  wonderful  to  have  the  intervals 
of  pink  to  look  forward  to,  though,"  Aubrey  found 
the  atonement.  "They  are  .  singularly  lovely, 
aren't  they?  Will  you  think  me  very  silly,  now, 
I  wonder,  or  sillier  than  you  always  think  me?" 

"  I  don't  think  you  silly,  my  dear  Aubrey,"  Mrs. 
Pomfrey  interposed,  "only  guileless;  you  are  very 
guileless;  I've  thought  that  ever  since  you  were 
taken  in  by  that  dreadful  cook  of  yours,  who  had 
red  hair,  and  got  drunk  and  rubbed  the  whitebait 
through  a  sieve." 

"Well,"  Aubrey  continued,  smiling  his  gentle, 
tentative  smile,  "my  foxgloves,  at  all  events,  can't 
take  me  in,  and  since  they  are  so  very  unusual  and 
so  lovely  I  thought  I'd  ask  a  few  people  in  to-day 
to  see  them.  The  Carews,  you  know,  and  Barton, 
and  Mrs.  and  Miss  Pickering.  And  you  —  if  you 
can  come.  I  '11  put  it  off  till  to-morrow,  if  that  will 
secure  you,  only  the  foxgloves  may  not  be  quite  so 
lovely  by  then." 

"I  will  come  with  pleasure,  my  dear  Aubrey," 
said  Mrs.  Pomfrey,  "and  though  nobody  will 
appreciate  your  foxgloves  as  you  do,  we  shall  all 
enjoy  your  tea." 

"Miss  Pickering  cares  very  much  for  flowers,  you 
know,  very  much.  We  've  talked  a  great  deal  about 
flowers,"  said  Aubrey,  swinging  his  eyeglass  and 
nodding  as  he  looked  at  his  old  friend. 

"Does  she?  She  does  n't  know  much  about  'em 
though." 

"No;  all  those  years  in  India,  and  in  towns. 
She  has  lived  so  much  in  towns.  Such  an  inap 
propriate  life  it  seems  for  such  an  exquisite  crea 
ture." 

"Does  it?"  said  Mrs.  Pomfrey.  She  added  after 

[  154] 


PINK  FOXGLOFES 

a  moment,  as  if  with  concession,  "She  is  a  very 
pretty  girl." 

Aubrey  Westmacott  was  not  acute.  "Isn't 
she?"  he  said  eagerly.  "A  beautiful  and  noble  and 
lovely  head,  is  n't  it?  like  a  flower;  she  is  altogether 
like  a  flower,  with  her  slenderness  and  height.  Do 
you  know,"  he  went  on,  swinging  his  glasses  more 
quickly,  while  he  kept  his  ingenuous  eyes  on  his 
friend,  "can  you  guess  the  flower  she  makes  me 
think  of?  In  that  pale  pink  dress,  that  pink  dress 
she  wore  the  other  day  at  the  rectory  garden  party, 
and  with  that  white  hat  lined  with  pink.  Can  you 
guess?"  His  eyes  overflowed  with  their  suggestion. 

Mrs.  Pomfrey  moved  hers  from  his  face  to  the 
foxgloves.  "Like  those,  I  suppose  you  mean." 

"/j  n't  she?"  he  repeated.  "Now,  is  n't  it  quite 
remarkable?  You  see  it,  too." 

"Yes;  I  see  it,"  said  Mrs.  Pomfrey.  She  studied 
the  flowers  and  again,  after  a  deliberating  pause, 
went  on,  "Do  you  think  Mrs.  Pickering  is  like  pur 
ple  foxgloves?" 

Aubrey's  eyeglass  tumbled  from  his  hand.  He 
was  astonished,  almost  indignant.  "Mrs.  Picker- 
ing?" 

"She  looks  like  her  daughter,"  said  Mrs.  Pom 
frey;  "as  much  like  her,  that  is,  as  a  purple  foxglove 
looks  like  a  pink  one." 

"I  can  imagine  nothing  more  unlike  a  flower 
than  Mrs.  Pickering,"  said  Aubrey,  with  gathered 
repudiation. 

"No;  certainly;  she's  not  at  all  like  a  flower. 
She's  more  like  a  sparrow  —  something  sharp  and 
commonplace  and  civic.  I  only  intended  an  anal 
ogy,  for  she  must  have  been  a  very  pretty  girl." 

"Nothing  could  be  less  sharp  or  commonplace  or 

t  iss  ] 


PINK  FOXGLOVES 

civic  than  Miss  Pickering,"  Aubrey  was  now  deeply 
flushed. 

"Oh,  of  course  not,  my  dear  Aubrey;  she  is  very 
unusual  looking,"  Mrs.  Pomfrey  again  conceded. 
"And  she  is  tall  and  her  mother  is  short.  Old 
Colonel  Pickering,  too,  was  tall,  I  remember.  I  saw 
him  once  or  twice  when  they  were  living  at  Chelten 
ham  the  year  before  he  died!  a  bleached,  dull, 
oppressed  old  man,  a  much  better  type  than  the 
wife;  she  ruled  him,  I  heard,  with  a  rod  of  iron. 
One  may  be  sure  that  she  does  n't  rule  Miss  Leila. 
She  is  a  young  lady  with  a  will  of  her  own,  unless 
I  am  much  mistaken  in  her." 

"A  will  of  her  own;  yes,  yes"  —  Aubrey  eagerly, 
pathetically  to  Mrs.  Pomfrey's  ear,  gathered  up  the 
ambiguous  fragments  —  "and  great  firmness  of 
will;  great  decision  of  character;  and  the  serenity, 
you  know,  the  sweet  dignity  that  go  with  it,  that 
so  often  go  with  it.  You  have  noticed  her  serenity, 
her  dignity.  And  she  is  very  silent  —  a  great  con 
trast  to  her  mother.  I  often  wonder  what  brought 
them  here.  It's  very  fortunate  for  all  of  us;  but 
Mrs.  Pickering  is,  as  you  say,  so  civic,  yes,  so 
commonplace,  that  I  don't  understand  what  she 
can  find  in  this  quiet  place  to  please  her.  She  cer 
tainly  does  n't  care  about  her  garden.  Those  beds 
about  The  Cottage  are  very  distressing;  they  dis 
tress  Miss  Pickering." 

"It's  quite  clear  to  me  why  they  came,"  said 
Mrs.  Pomfrey.  "They  can't  afford  London,  and,  I 
suppose,  know  nobody  there  if  they  could;  and 
there  is  more  chance  of  a  pretty  girl  like  Miss  Leila 
marrying  well  here  than  there  is  in  Cheltenham. 
She  does  n't  hunt,  it's  true;  but  the  hunting  makes 
a  difference,  and  there  is  a  good  deal  going  on  in 

[  156] 


PINK  FOXGLOFES 

one  way  and  another.  Mrs.  Pickering  hoped  to 
capture  Arthur  Barton;  she  made  that  very  evi 
dent.  But  he  has  never  looked  at  another  woman 
since  his  wife  died,  and  never  will,  I  imagine;  at  all 
events,  he  did  n't  look  at  Miss  Leila." 
'.  Aubrey's  eyes,  dwelling  on  her,  expressed  rep 
robation  and  almost  horror.  "  She  tried  to  marry 
her  daughter  to  Barton!  That  lovely  child  and 
Barton!  What  a  terrible  woman!" 

"Miss  Pickering  must  be  a  good  twenty-five,  my 
dear  Aubrey,  and  I  was  married  at  eighteen.  No; 
I  don't  like  Mrs.  Pickering,  but  I  can  see  nothing 
reprehensible  in  her  determination  to  settle  her 
daughter  well  in  life." 

"But  Barton!  He  is  fifty!  He  must  be  fifty!  He 
must  be  older  than  I  am;  yes,  very  considerably 
older  than  I  am." 

"Well?"  said  Mrs.  Pomfrey,  and  there  was  a 
mingled  reluctance  and  grimness  in  her  smile, 
"and  do  you  think  of  yourself  as  unmarriageable  ? " 

He  ran  his  hand  several  times  over  his  head  and 
through  his  hair.  He  was  still  flushed,  but  sud 
denly  he  became  pale,  swallowing  quickly  several 
times. 

"Do  you  know  —  you  have  said  something  — 
you  have  made  me  think  something  —  put  some 
thing  before  me.  Yes;  I  must  tell  you,  I  must  tell 
you,"  he  said,  thrusting  his  hands  into  his  pockets 
and  fixing  his  eyes  on  the  wall  above  Mrs.  Pomfrey's 
head.  "I  love  her;  I  love  Miss  Pickering.  You 
may  think  it  absurd.  I  know  I  'm  a  dull  old  bache 
lor;  everything  of  that  sort;  but  there  it  is.  Ever 
since  I  saw  her,  a  year  ago,  when  they  first  came. 
I  never  dreamed  of  anything  else.  A  dull  old 
bachelor,  nothing  to  offer,  and  twice  her  age.  But 

1 157 1 


PINK  FOXGLOVES 

I  can't  help  wondering  —  it's  only  a  wonder  — 
whether  there  might  just  be  a  chance  for  me  —  if 
you  don't  think  my  age,  and  all  that,  makes  it  im 
possible.  What  I  mean,"  Aubrey  finished,  with  a 
sort  of  quiet  desperation,  "is  —  could  she  love  me? 
It  would  have  to  be  love  with  a  girl  like  Miss 
Pickering.  Am  I  a  man  that  a  girl  like  that  could 
love?" 

Tears  now  were  in  his  eyes  as  he  brought  them 
back  to  Mrs.  Pomfrey's,  and  seated  upon  the  sofa, 
the  pink  foxgloves  in  the  Chinese  bowl  beside  her, 
she  looked  back  at  him  very  gravely.  She  was  so 
grave  that  for  some  moments  she  was  silent.  Then, 
before  speaking,  she  took  out  her  spectacles  and 
polished  them  and  put  them  on.  She  saw  him 
quite  well  without  them.  It  was  as  if  in  emphasis  of 
the  gravity  of  the  moment.  And,  in  the  first  place, 
she  did  not  answer  his  question. 

"How  much  have  you  seen,  my  dear  Aubrey,  of 
this  young  lady?"  she  enquired. 

He  said,  faltering,  that  he  had  seen  a  good  deal  of 
Miss  Pickering  during  this  spring  and  summer. 
Mrs.  Pickering  had  been  very  kind,  had  asked  him 
there  quite  often  for  tennis;  and  Miss  Pickering 
had  been  far  more  kind,  for  she  had  played  with 
him  and  he  was  a  wretched  player,  though  he  was 
so  fond  of  the  game.  "And  we've  had  one  or  two 
little  walks.  She  came  with  me  to  the  woods  this 
spring  and  helped  me  to  dig  anemone  roots.  Oh! 
I  don't  pretend  it's  anything  at  all;  it's  only,  I 
know,  her  kindness;  I  never  thought  it  anything 
else.  But  —  if  you  really  don't  think  me  absurd 
for  dreaming  of  it  —  ?"  He  faltered  to  a  long  gaz 
ing  question. 

Mrs.  Pomfrey  now  rose.   She  stood  looking  away 

1 158] 


PINK  FOXGLOFES 

from  him,  then  moved  towards  the  door.  "My 
dear  Aubrey,"  she  said,  "I  think  of  you  what  any 
body  who  knows  you  must  think  —  that  the 
woman  who  wins  your  love  is  one  of  the  most 
fortunate  of  women.  Whether  you  are  the  kind  of 
man  that  a  girl  like  Miss  Pickering  could  love,  I 
cannot  say.  I've  really  seen  very  little  of  her.  All 
that  I  know  of  her  is  that  she  is  very  pretty  and  has 
nice  quiet  manners.  If  she  marries  you,  she  is,  as  I 
say,  the  most  fortunate  of  women." 

Mrs.  Pamfrey  stepped  out  into  the  little  square, 
flagged  hall.  He  accompanied  her  to  the  garden 
gate,  following  her  speechless,  while,  lifting  up  her 
skirts,  displaying  large,  flat-heeled  shoes,  she 
stepped  down  from  terrace  to  terrace.  She  paused 
at  the  last. 

"Your  Alpine  phlox  is  doing  very  nicely.  You'll 
find  that  by  next  year  it  will  have  spread  to  a  foot 
across,"  she  said.  He  had  put  in  the  Alpine  phlox 
the  autumn  before  under  her  supervision.  She 
added  at  the  gate,  "By  that  time  there  may  be  a 
Mrs.  Westmacott  at  Meadows." 

Pale,  almost  tearful,  he  pressed  her  hand  over 
the  gate.  "I  can't  say  how  I  thank  you,"  he  mur 
mured. 

After  a  little  while  he  was  able  to  compose  his 
thoughts  and  write  his  notes.  Thompson  took  them 
round,  and  before  lunch  he  had  his  answers.  They 
could  all  come,  except  Mr.  Barton,  the  dapper, 
fussy,  kindly,  pepper-and-salt  little  squire,  who 
lived  in  the  beautiful  big  house  just  over  the  nearest 
hill;  he  had  gone  up  to  London  for  the  day. 

Aubrey  very  much  enjoyed  giving  little  tea- 
parties  at  Meadows.  In  London  he  had  not  enjoyed 
them  at  all.  He  had  given  them  when  duty  required 

1 159 1 


PINK  FOXGLOVES 

it,  and  he  had  sometimes  been  very  extravagant  and 
had  taken  a  couple  of  young  girl  cousins,  up  for  the 
season,  to  a  restaurant  and  a  play.  But  he  had 
never  enjoyed  these  occasions.  He  was  shy  and  a 
poor  talker,  and  in  London  the  demands  upon  one's 
personality  were  too  heavy  to  make  his  enter 
taining  a  success.  The  demands  upon  one's  per 
sonality  in  the  country  were  so  small  and  so  easily 
satisfied;  a  garden  talked  for  one  and  entertained 
for  one.  All  his  neighbours,  except  Mrs.  Pickering, 
whose  formal  beds  did  not  count,  had  gardens  and 
were  profoundly  interested  in  them.  The  mild, 
middle-aged  Carews  were  authorities,  and  to-day 
he  remembered,  with  all  the  pressure  of  his  new 
preoccupations,  that  he  must  question  them  about 
that  matter  of  mulching. 

At  four-thirty  he  saw  two  parasols  approaching 
along  his  box  hedges  —  one  was  black  and  one  was 
rose-colour;  his  heart  stood  still  when  he  saw  it. 
She  would  be  wearing,  then,  the  dress  that  made 
her  look  more  than  ever  like  a  pink  foxglove.  He 
went  down  the  terraces  to  greet  mother  and  daugh 
ter  at  the  gate. 

Mrs.  Pickering  was  short  and  stout  and  blonde, 
her  slightly  rapacious  features  —  small  aquiline 
nose,  small  smiling  mouth,  and  small  projecting 
chin  —  embedded  and  muffled,  as  it  were,  in  pow 
dery  expanses  of  cheek  and  throat.  She  had  an  un 
smiling,  steel-blue  eye,  appraising,  determined, 
deliberate,  under  its  level  bar  of  dark  eyebrow. 
She  did  not  please  Aubrey.  Her  voice  in  especial, 
metallic  yet  glossy,  as  if  with  a  careful  veneer, 
disturbed  him.  A  gossiping  lady  of  the  neighbour 
hood  had  informed  him  that  Mrs.  Pickering's  origins 
were  quite  lacking  in  distinction  and  that  m  her 

f  160  1 


PINK  FOXGLOFES 

handsome  girlhood  she  had  stalked  the  stupid 
Colonel  —  of  a  quite  good  family  —  and  had 
brought  him  down,  resistless,  at  the  first  shot. 
These  stories,  for  which  he  had  not  liked  his  in 
formant  the  more,  seemed  to  hover  in  Mrs.  Picker 
ing's  glance  and  smile,  and  her  voice  to  preserve 
the  flavour  of  many  strategies  and  triumphs.  But 
Aubrey  did  not  look  for  long  at  Mrs.  Pickering. 
She  rustled  in,  dressed  in  her  fashionable  black  and 
white,  a  long  chain  of  steel  and  brilliants  crossing 
her  buttressed  bosom,  a  crest  of  plumes,  black  and 
white,  waving  upon  her  head. 

Miss  Pickering  followed  her  mother.  Tall,  very 
tall,  and  poised  with  a  lovely  grace,  she  was,  but 
for  the  arresting  darkness  of  brows  and  lashes,  fair; 
with  the  infantile  fairness,  the  wild-rose  tints,  that 
to  the  ingenuous  male  will  always  seem  to  vouch  for 
a  spiritual  exquisiteness  to  match.  And  she,  too, 
had  small,  aquiline  features,  and  her  hair  was  as 
golden  as  the  heart  of  a  wild  rose.  She  did  not 
smile,  like  her  mother;  she  was  a  serene  young 
lady,  and  silent,  as  loveliness  should  be. 

"This  sweet  place!"  said  Mrs.  Pickering.  "How 
charmingly  you  are  improving  it,  Mr.  Westmacott; 
it  looks  prettier  every  time  I  see  it." 

"It  will  take  years  before  it  looks  as  I  mean  it  to 
look,"  said  Aubrey,  leading  them  up  the  terraces. 
"That's  the  joy  of  gardening,  is  n't  it?  It  gives 
one  something  to  plan  for  one's  whole  future." 
He  smiled  with  a  slight  appealingness  at  Miss 
Pickering.  "I  am  afraid  I  make  myself  rather 
foolish  sometimes;  I  talk  so  much  about  my  gar 
den." 

"I  don't  wonder  that  you  do,"  said  Mrs.  Picker 
ing;  "it's  quite  a  little  Paradise." 

[  161  ] 


PINK  FOXGLOFES 

In  the  drawing-room  it  was  Mrs.  Pickering  who 
continued  to  talk.  She  renewed  her  laments  over 
the  water-colours.  "To  think  that  these  beautiful 
old  places  should  get  into  the  hands  of  common, 
middle-class  people!" — Aubrey  had  again  to  as 
sure  her  that  the  people  who  had  bought  his 
mother's  old  home  were  very  nice  indeed.  —  And 
Mrs.  Pickering  said  that  she  doted  upon  his  room, 
"So  old-world,  so  peaceful!"  and  expatiated  on  the 
view  of  the  terraced  lawns  and  further  meadows 
from  the  window.  She  made  no  comment  on  his 
foxgloves,  and  it  seemed  like  a  presage  of  happiness 
when  Miss  Pickering,  from  her  chair,  remarked, 
looking  up  at  them,  "How  lovely  your  pink  fox 
gloves  are!" 

"You  think  so?  You  like  them?  Yes,  yes,  are 
they  not  lovely?"  He  was  delighted  with  her  com 
mendation. 

"It's  such  a  pretty  idea,  putting  them  with  the 
grasses,"  said  Miss  Pickering.  "I  do  like  lots  of 
flowers  in  a  room." 

He  di^l  not  have  an  opportunity  of  speaking  with 
her  alone  till  after  tea.  Then,  when  they  had  all 
gone  into  the  garden  —  how  it  happened  he  did  not 
know,  for  he  would  not  have  dared  arrange  it  — 
he  found  himself  walking  down  the  path  towards 
the  copse  with  Miss  Pickering,  while  behind  them, 
quite  far  already  behind  them,  Mrs.  Pickering 
paused  and  exclaimed  over  the  herbaceous  border, 
Mr.  Carew  beside  her.  Mrs.  Carew  and  Mrs.  Pom- 
frey  had  sat  down  under  the  trees  near  the  house. 

"Would  you  like  to  see  the  pink  foxgloves  grow 
ing?"  he  asked  her.  "They  are  very  beautiful 
growing  —  more  beautiful,  I  think  you  '11  feel,  than 
in  the  house." 

[  162] 


PINK  FOXGLOVES 

"I'd  love  to  see  them,"  said  Miss  Pickering. 

They  crossed  the  slip  of  meadow  among  the  tall 
grasses  and,  "There,"  said  Aubrey,  pointing,  with 
a  faint  smile,  "there  they  are!" 

"How  sweet!"  said  Miss  Pickering,  with  her 
serene  emphasis.  They  stood  to  look. 

"Do  you  know,"  said  Aubrey,  wondering  at 
himself,  but  he  felt  upborne,  "that  I  find  they  look 
like  you  —  the  pink  ones." 

"Really?"  She  smiled  now,  turning  her  calm, 
blue  eyes  upon  him.  "That's  very  flattering." 

"No,  no;  not  flattering;  not  at  all  flattering," 
said  Aubrey.  "Not  at  all,  not  at  all,"  he  repeated 
under  his  breath.  He  could  say  no  more  just  then. 
They  walked  on,  his  heart  in  a  flutter. 

"Have  you  ever  heard  a  willow-wren,  Miss 
Pickering?"  he  asked  suddenly. 

"A  willow-wren?  I  don't  think  so.  I  don't  know 
much  about  birds." 

"It  is  usually  singing  in  the  wood  at  this  hour. 
Would  you  care  to  come  and  see  if  we  can  hear  it?" 

"I'd  love  to.  I  wish  you'd  teach  me  all  about 
birds,"  said  Miss  Pickering. 

His  heart  was  thumping  now.  They  entered  the 
copse.  It  seemed  to  him,  as  they  passed  them,  that 
the  foxgloves  were  tall  angels  set  about  Paradise 
and  welcoming  him  there.  It  was  very  still  among 
the  trees.  Miss  Pickering  walked  lightly  beside 
him.  She,  too,  looked  like  an  angel.  They  reached 
a  clearing,  where  an  old  fallen  log  lay,  and  here  they 
sat  down.  "We  shall  hear  it,  I  think,"  said  Aubrey, 
"  if  we  sit  here  quietly." 

Presently,  in  the  stillness,  the  little  bird  began 
to  sing  its  song,  the  descending  chromatic  chain  of 
liquid  notes,  melancholy  and  happy;  the  song  of  his 

[  163 1 


PINK  FOXGLOVES 

very  soul,  Aubrey  felt,  and  that  the  bird  said  for 
him  all  that  he  could  not  say  as,  with  head  bent, 
he  sat  listening,  the  beloved  presence  beside  him. 
She  was  part  of  the  song;  and  in  it,  as  they  listened 
together,  their  very  hearts  were  mingling.  They 
knew  each  other,  he  felt  sure,  very  well. 

"How  sweet!"  she  murmured,  and  he  nodded, 
not  able  to  look  at  her. 

There  was  a  silence,  and  then  the  bird  sang  again. 
He  raises  his  eyes  to  hers  now,  and  they  turned  to 
him  and  smiled.  Her  hand  lay  on  the  rough  bark  of 
the  log,  and  his  was  near  it.  Was  it  her  hand  that 
responded  to  the  unconscious  appeal  of  his,  or  had 
he  dared?  He  held  it.  That  was  the  bewildering, 
the  transcending  fact. 

"Oh,  Miss  Pickering!  Miss  Leila  —  Leila,"  he 
stammered.  "May  I  tell  you?  May  I  ask  you? 
Can  you  care  for  me?" 

Her  eyes  still  smiled,  if  very  gravely.  "Do  you 
really  love  me?"  she  murmured. 

"Oh,  Leila!"  he  repeated.  The  willow-wren  still 
sang,  but  all  the  little  chains  of  sound  seemed  to  be 
woven  into  a  mist  about  him,  trembling,  shining. 
He  held  her  hand  to  his  lips.  He  wished  to  kneel 
before  her.  This  was  Paradise. 

"It's  so  very  sudden,"  said  Leila  Pickering.  "I 
never  dreamed  you  cared  till  just. 'now." 

"Ever  since  I  saw  you  first  —  ever  since  I  saw 
your  eyes.  It  has  been  like  the  fragrance  of  my 
flowers  at  evening,  like  the  moon  rising  on  my 
flowers.  I  did  not  dare  to  hope  —  you  so  young,  so 
lovely;  —  life  before  you." 

"I  think  we  can  be  very  happy  together,"  said 
Leila  Pickering.  "  I  knew  you  were  a  dear  from  the 
first  moment  I  saw  you,  too." 

[  164] 


PINK  FOXGLOVES 

The  willow-wren  stopped  singing  now  and  flew 
away.  In  the  distance,  then,  he  heard  the  liquid, 
dropping  notes,  and  they  sounded  very  sad.  His 
arm  was  around  Leila  Pickering,  and  she  leaned 
her  head  on  his  shoulder,  so  that  in  an  ecstasy  of 
wonder  he  felt  the  warm  brightness  of  her  hair 
against  his  cheek.  He  had  never  heard  her  talk  so 
much.  She  told  him  that  she  had  had  such  a  dull, 
horrid  life,  so  poor,  knowing  such  tiresome,  second- 
rate  people.  And  she  did  not  get  on  at  all  well  with 
her  mother. 

"Nobody  has  ever  really  understood  me  —  till 
you  came,"  she  said,  sitting  upright  now  beside  him, 
the  lovely  colour  in  her  cheeks  delicately  height 
ened,  her  eyes  shining  while  she  talked.  She  confided 
in  him.  She  loved  him.  They  were  betrothed  —  this 
was  the  blissful,  culminating  thought  that  seemed 
to  go  in  waves  of  music  through  him  as  he  gazed 
at  her.  He  had  ceased  to  hear  the  willow-wren's 
melancholy  little  song.  And  then  he  heard  her  say: 

"I  don't  want  to  live  in  the  coun.try,  you  know. 
You  won't  mind?  Of  course  I  love  it;  but  we  can 
pay  week-end  visits,  always;  —  you  must  know 
such  heaps  of  nice  people;  friends.  And  we'll 
travel  too  —  I  long  to  see  the  world.  India  does  n't 
count.  Only  think,  I've  never  been  to  Paris  except 
once  —  on  a  horrid,  cheap  trip,  for  a  week.  We 
never  could  afford  to  do  anything  really  amusing  or 
buy  any  really  nice  things.  My  life  has  been  so 
frightfully  dull,  and  I  do  want  to  stretch  my  wings 
and  see  lots  of  people  and  entertain  and  go  to  plays, 
you  know.  I  adore  London.  I'm  sure  I  shall  be  a 
good  hostess." 

It  was  as  if  a  sword  had  transfixed  him.  He 
seemed  to  hear  a  great  bell  booming  —  a  great 

[  165  ] 


PINK  FOXGLOFES 

London  bell  —  Big  Ben;  he  had  always  heard  Big 
Ben  from  his  office  in  Whitehall,  and  there  had  been 
a  jangle  of  bells  in  Kensington,  too,  and  a  roar,  a 
ceaseless  roar.  And  he  seemed  to  hear  the  words 
"Dangerous,  dangerous."  He  had  been  too  happy. 

He  kept  his  mild,  kind  eyes  of  a  pastel  blue  upon 
her,  and  he  told  himself,  while  he  wrestled,  trans 
fixed,  that  she  must  not  guess;  but,  as  if  pressed 
from  his  anguish,  he  heard  himself  murmuring 
helplessly,  though  the  gentle,  fixed  smile  held  his 
lips,  "You  don't  care  for  my  little  place,  then? 
You  would  n't  care  to  go  on  living  at  Meadows  ?  It 's 
a  nice  little  place,  Meadows  —  a  nice  little  place; 
we  could  make  it  very  pretty,  and  we  could  have 
people  here,  as  many  as  you  wanted." 

Had  a  note  of  pleading,  almost  desperate,  crept 
in  unawares  ?  He  saw  her  calm  eyes  harden  slightly, 
fixed  on  him.  And  he  saw,  then,  tears  rise  in  them. 

"Oh!  it's  so  dull,  so  dull,  down  here!"  she 
breathed.  "  It 's  a  darling  little  place,  Meadows  —  of 
course,  of  course  I  love  it.  I  wish  we  could  afford  to 
keep  it,  just  to  run  down  to  for  a  quiet  week-end 
now  and  then;  but  you  could  n't,  could  you?  And 
it's  far  too  small  for  entertaining,  is  n't  it?  And  no 
one  really  smart  cares  to  come  and  stay  with  one  if 
one  has  no  shooting,  nothing  to  offer.  One  can 
really  live  in  London  —  I  Ve  always  felt  that.  You  do 
care  more  for  me  than  you  do  for  Meadows?"  she 
finished  with  a  smile,  half  appealing  and  half 
challenging. 

And  looking  into  the  blue  eyes,  blurred  and  en 
larged,  like  a  child's,  with  their  tears,  he  saw  him 
self  as  mean  and  petty  and  selfish.  He  loved  her, 
and  was  it  only  as  another  flower  to  place  among  his 
flowers,  another  treasure  to  place  among  his  treas- 

[  166] 


PINK  FOXGLOVES 

ures,  a  possession  of  his  own,  without  end  or  pur 
pose  for  itself?  He  loved  her,  and,  unimaginably, 
she  loved  him  and  would  marry  him.  Love  must 
know  pain  and  sacrifice  —  "pain  and  sacrifice" 
—  he  seemed  to  hear  himself  repeating.  This  was 
a  young  life,  with  its  rights  to  life,  and  it  must 
stretch  its  wings. 

He  smiled  at  her  and  raised  her  hand  again  to 
his  lips,  saying,  "  Of  course  I  care  more  for  you  than 
for  Meadows,  dear  Leila.  Of  course  we  will  live 
where  you  choose." 

And  very  radiant  now,  rising  and  smiling  down 
upon  him,  Leila  Pickering  said,  "You  are  a  dear. 
I'm  sure  it's  best  for  us  both;  we'd  get  so  pokey 
here.  I  know  we  could  n't  afford  Mayfair  —  I 
would  n't  dream  of  that;  but  I  think  a  house  in  one 
of  those  little  new  streets  near  Cadogan  Square 
would  be  just  right  for  us;  don't  you?" 


CARNATIONS 


UPERT  WILSON  came  into 
the  studio  where  his  wife,  who 
had  been  out  sketching  all  the 
morning,  was  washing  her 
paint-brushes,  carefully  turn 
ing  and  rubbing  them  in  a  pot 
of  turpentine.  She  wore  her 
painting  apron,  for  Marian  in  the  midst  of  her  ar 
tistic  avocations  was  always  neat  and  spotless;  and, 
half  turned  from  him  as  she  was,  she  did  not  look 
round  as  he  entered.  Rupert  carried  his  stick,  a 
rustic,  ashen  stick  of  which  he  was  very  fond,  and 
his  Panama  hat;  he  was  going  out  and  Marian 
probably  knew  that  he  was  going  out,  and  where; 
this  made  it  more  difficult  to  say  in  a  sufficiently 
disengaged  voice,  "  I  'm  just  going  down  to  see  Mrs. 
Dallas  for  a  little  while." 

"Oh!  are  you?"  said  Marian.  She  continued  to 
stir  her  brushes,  and  though  her  wish,  also,  very 
evidently  was  to  appear  disengaged  and  indifferent, 
she  was  not  able  to  carry  it  out,  for  she  added,  as  if 
irrepressibly,  "You  need  hardly  have  taken  the 
trouble  to  come  and  tell  me  that." 

Rupert  looked  at  her,  and  since  she  did  not  look 
at  him,  it  was  very  intently,  as  if  to  measure  to  the 
full  the  difference  between  this  Marian  and  the 

[  168] 


CARNATIONS 

Marian  he  had  known  and  believed  in.  It  was  hard 
to  realize  that  his  wife  should  show  a  trivial  and 
unworthy  jealousy  and  should  strike  him  such  a 
blow;  for  that  it  was  a  blow  he  knew  from  the  heat 
in  his  cheek  and  the  quickening  of  his  pulse;  but, 
as  he  looked  at  her,  standing  there  turned  from 
him,  her  blue  apron  girt  about  her,  her  black  hair 
bound  so  gracefully  around  her  head,  the  realiza 
tion  uppermost  in  his  mind  was  that  Marian,  since 
the  second  baby  had  come,  had  grown  very  stout 
and  matronly.  He  seemed  to  see  it  to-day  for  the 
first  time,  as  if  his  awareness  of  it  came  to  em 
phasize  his  sudden  consciousness  of  her  spiritual 
deficiency. 

When  he  had  met  and  fallen  so  very  deeply  in 
love  with  Marian,  she  had  been,  if  not  slender,  yet 
of  a  supple  and  shapely  form,  with  just  roundness 
and  softness  enough  to  contrast  delightfully  with 
her  rather  boyish  head,  her  air,  clear,  fresh,  frank, 
of  efficiency  and  swiftness.  He  had,  of  course, 
found  her  a  great  deal  more  than  clear  and  fresh 
and  frank;  but,  entangled  as  he  had  been  in  that 
wretched  love-affair  with  Aimee  Pollard,  —  the 
pretty,  untalented  young  actress  who  had  so  shame 
fully  misused  him,  —  torn  to  pieces  and  sunken  in 
quagmires  as  he  had  been,  these  qualities  in  Marian 
had  reached  him  first  like  a  draught  of  cold  spring 
water,  like  dawn  over  valley  hills.  These  were  the 
metaphors  he  had  very  soon  used  to  her  when  she 
had  applied  her  firm,  kind  hands  to  the  disentan 
gling  of  his  knots  and  her  merry,  steady  mind  to 
tracing  out  for  him  the  path  of  honourable  retreat. 
He  had  found  her  so  wonderful  and  lovely  and  had 
fallen  so  much  in  love  with  her  that  his  ardour, 
aided  by  her  quiet  fidelity,  had  overborne  all  the 

1 169] 


CARNATIONS 

opposition  of  her  people.  Foolish,  conventional 
people  they  were,  —  their  opposition  based,  it 
appeared,  almost  unimaginably  to  his  generous 
young  mind,  on  the  fact  that  Marian  happened  to 
have  money  and  that  he  had  none,  except  what  he 
might  make  by  his  books;  and  also,  though  it  was 
nearly  as  unimaginable,  on  the  fact  that  a  good 
many  of  these  people  were  in  the  peerage.  Marian, 
a  year  before  he  had  met  her,  had  broken  away 
from  the  stereotyped  routine  of  their  country  life 
and  had  come  to  London  to  study  painting;  and  it 
was  that  Marian  of  the  past  who  had  seemed  to 
share  to  the  full  all  his  idealisms.  They  had  mar 
ried  within  three  months  of  their  meeting. 

From  such  a  dawn,  white,  fresh,  blissful,  to  this 
dull  daylight!  from  such  a  Marian  to  this  narrow- 
minded  matron!  Marian  still  had  beauty.  Her  clear 
eyes  were  as  blue,  her  wide,  pale  lips  as  sweet;  but 
she  was  a  matron.  Her  neck  had  grown  shorter, 
her  chin  heavier;  the  girlish  grace  of  glance  and 
smile  seemed  muted,  muffled  by  their  setting;  there 
was  no  longer  any  poetry  in  her  physique.  And  as 
Rupert  stood  looking  at  her  and  seeing  all  this, 
his  sense  of  grievance,  though  he  was  unaware  of 
this  factor  in  it,  grew  deeper. 

A  little  while  passed  before  he  said,  —  and  it 
was,  he  felt,  with  dignity,  —  "I  really  don't  know 
what  you  mean  by  that,  Marian." 

She  had  now  finished  her  brushes  and  had  taken 
up  her  palette.  She  began  to  scrape  the  edges  as 
she  answered,  —  and  her  voice  was  not  schooled,  it 
was  heavy  with  its  irony  and  gloom,  —  "Don't 
you?  I'm  sorry." 

"I  trust  indeed  that  it  does  n't  mean  that  you 
are  jealous  of  my  friendship  for  Mrs.  Dallas?" 

[  170] 


CARNATIONS 

"Friendship?  Oh,  no;  I'm  not  jealous  of  any 
friendship." 

"Of  my  affection,  then;  of  my  love,  if  you  like," 
said  Rupert.  "You  know  perfectly  well  what  I  feel 
about  all  that  —  and  I  thought  you  felt  it,  too. 
It's  the  very  centre  of  my  life,  of  my  art;  my  books 
turn  on  it.  It's  the  thing  I  have  most  of  all  to  say 
to  the  world.  Love  is  n't  a  measured,  limited  thing; 
its  nature  is  to  grow  and  give.  My  love  for  Mrs. 
Dallas  does  n't  touch  your  and  my  relation;  it  en 
riches  it  rather." 

Marian  scraped  her  palette  and  said  nothing. 
He  could  see  her  cheek,  the  cheek  that  ran  too 
massively  into  her  neck.  Marian's  skin  was  white 
and  fine;  a  faint  colour  now  rose  to  it;  a  faint 
colour  was,  in  Marian,  a  deep  blush. 

To  see  her  blush  like  that  gave  him  an  odd  sen 
sation.  It  was  as  if  the  blush  were  echoed  in  his 
heart;  he  felt  it  grow  and  melt  softly,  and  there 
drifted  through  his  mind  a  thought  of  Mrs.  Dallas 
and  of  her  magic. 

Through  the  studio  window,  draped  with  its 
summer  creepers,  he  could  see  the  two  perambula 
tors  moored  in  the  shade  of  the  lime  tree  on  the 
lawn.  The  babies  were  having  their  afternoon 
sleep.  He  was  very  fond  of  his  children;  and  to 
feel,  now,  mingling  with  the  strange,  yearning  glow, 
this  pause  of  contemplative  fondness,  was  to  feel 
himself  justified  anew  and  anew  aggrieved.  The 
glow  of  tenderness  seemed  to  envelope  the  babies 
as  well  as  Mrs.  Dallas.  And  it  shut  out  Marian. 

What  had  she  to  complain  of?  Was  he  not  a  ten 
der  husband  and  a  loving  father  ?  Could  she  suspect 
his  love  for  Mrs.  Dallas  —  it  was  she  herself  who 
had  forced  him  to  use  that  word  —  of  grossness  or 


CARNATIONS 

vulgarity?  It  was  as  high  and  as  pure  as  his  love 
for  her. 

His  love  for  Marian  had  evolved  into  the  peram 
bulators,  and  this  recognition,  flitting  unseason 
ably,  vexed  him  with  a  sense  of  slight  confusion 
that  made  him  feel  more  injured  than  before.  It 
was  true  that,  theoretically,  he  held  views  so 
advanced  as  to  justify,  in  true,  self-dedicating  pas 
sion,  all  manifestations.  Practice  and  theory  in  his 
young  life  had  been  far  apart;  but  the  thought  of 
passion,  in  connection  with  Mrs.  Dallas,  had,  as  it 
were,  been  made  visible  by  Marian's  blush;  and, 
slightly  swinging  his  hat,  slightly  knotting  his 
brows  as  he  looked  at  the  matronly  Marian,  he 
groped  for  some  new  formulation  of  his  creed,  since 
it  was  evident  that  however  much  he  might  love 
Marian  it  was  no  longer  passion  he  felt  for  her. 
One  must  perhaps  allow  that  passions  could  not  be 
contemporaneous;  but  he  had  always  combated 
this  shackling  view. 

He  stood  there,  gazing,  trying  to  think  it  out,  — 
a  tall  young  man,  well  made  yet  slightly  uncouth, 
with  ruffled,  heavy  locks  and  large  intent  eyes. 
Something  of  the  look  of  a  not  quite  purely  bred 
Saint  Bernard  puppy  he  had;  confiding,  young  and 
foolish,  with  his  knotted  brow  and  nose  a  little 
overlong.  And  as  he  found  himself  unable  to  think 
it  out  and  as  Marian  still  stood  silent,  scraping, 
scraping  away  at  the  palette  in  an  exasperating 
fashion,  he  said,  —  and  now  in  an  openly  aggrieved 
voice,  —  "I  thought  you  liked  her  yourself;  I 
thought  you  quite  loved  her.  You  seemed  to." 

Now  that  he  was  losing  his  temper,  Marian  was 
regaining  hers.  Her  voice  had  all  the  advantage  of 
quiet  intentions  as  she  answered,  "I  did  like  her;  I 

[  172  ] 


CARNATIONS 

thought  her  very  charming.  I  don't  dislike  her  now. 
But  I'm  sorry  to  see  a  woman  of  her  age  behaving 
with  so  little  dignity." 

" A  woman  of  her  age!  Dignity!" 

"She  is  at  least  forty-five." 

"I  don't  follow  your  meaning.  Is  a  woman  of 
forty-five  cut  off  from  human  relationships?" 

"From  some,  certainly;  if  she  has  any  regard,  as 
I  say,  for  her  dignity.  And  a  woman  in  Mrs. 
Dallas's  position  ought  to  be  particularly  careful." 

"Mrs.  Dallas's  position!"  She  really  reduced 
him  to  disgusted  exclamations. 

"You  know,  Rupert,  that  there  are  all  sorts  of 
stories  about  her.  You  know  that  Mrs.  Trotter 
told  us  that  her  first  husband  divorced  her  on 
account  of  Colonel  Dallas.  —  Other  stones,  too." 

"Upon  my  word!  You  astonish  me,  Marian! 
You  heard  all  these  vile  tales  when  we  first  came 
here,  —  from  people,  too,  who  you'll  observe,  run 
to  Mrs.  Dallas's  dinner-parties  whenever  they  have 
the  chance,  —  and  you  did  n't  seem  to  mind  them 
much  when  you  were  going  there  almost  every  day 
—  and  taking  every  one  you  knew  to  see  her.  What 
about  your  Aunt  Sophy  —  if  you  believed  these 
stones?  —  An  old  dragon  of  conventionality  like 
your  Aunt  Sophy!  You  took  her  again  and  again, 
and  arranged  that  luncheon  in  London  with  her 
when  you  and  Mrs.  Dallas  went  up  —  so  that  they 
should  have  another  chance  really  to  make  friends. 
I  remember  you  used  the  expression,  'really  make 
friends.'  It's  odd  to  hear  you  talking  of  stories  at 
this  late  hour." 

"I  only  talk  of  them  because  Mrs.  Dallas  has 
made  me  remember  them.  I  am  quite  as  open- 
minded  as  you  are  about  such  things.  I  was  just 

1 173 1 


CARNATIONS 

as  ready  to  think  well  of  her  —  even  if  they  were 
true.  Why  do  you  call  them  vile?  You  would  n't 
think  it  wrong  for  a  woman  to  leave  her  husband 
if  she  did  n't  love  him,  and  to  go  with  a  man  she 
did  love.  If  Mrs.  Dallas  did  that,  why  is  it  vile  to 
say  so?  —  Aunt  Sophy,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  said  it 
was  a  different  story.  And  she  was  charmed  with 
Mrs.  Dallas,  just  as  I'd  determined  she  should  be, 
stories  or  no  stories.  I  did  all  I  could  for  her,  be 
cause  I  counted  myself  her  friend  and  thought  it  a 
shame  that  any  one  so  charming  should  be  hand 
icapped  in  any  way.  But  I  did  n't  imagine  that  a 
friend  would  try  to  take  my  husband  from  me." 
Marian  spoke  with  severe  and  deliberate  calm. 

"I  like  that!  I  really  do  like  that!"  said  Ru 
pert,  laughing  bitterly.  "It's  really  funny  to  hear 
you  talk  as  if  Mrs.  Dallas  could  owe  you  anything! 
I  wish  she  could  hear  you!  I  wish  we  could  have 
her  dispassionate  opinion  of  that  hideous  old  bore 
of  an  Aunt  Sophy.  It  was  obvious  enough  that 
she  put  up  with  her  simply  and  solely  through 
friendship  for  you.  Do  all  you  could  for  her!  A 
woman  who  has  hordes  of  friends  —  charming, 
finished,  cosmopolitan  people  of  the  world!  Why, 
my  dear  girl,  it's  she,  let  me  tell  you,  who  has  given 
you  more  chances  than  you  ever  had  in  your  life 
for  meeting  really  interesting  people!  They're  not 
the  sort  you'd  be  likely  to  meet  at  your  Aunt 
Sophy's,  certainly.  They'd  perish  in  her  milieu!" 

"Mrs.  Dallas  does  n't  perish  in  it,"  Marian 
coldly  commented.  "On  the  contrary,  I  never  saw 
her  more  alert.  She  did  n't  seem  to  find  Aunt  Sophy 
in  the  least  a  bore.  She  was  very  much  pleased  in 
deed  to  lunch  there  and  she  has  looked  her  up  every 
time  she's  gone  to  London  since;  moreover,  she's 

1 174] 


CARNATIONS 

going  to  stay  with  her  at  Crofts  this  autumn.  It 
does  n't  look  like  boredom." 

"I  wish  her  joy  of  Crofts!  She's  a  complete 
woman  of  the  world,  of  course,  and  she  knows  how 
to  put  up  with  all  sorts  and  conditions  of  bores. 
She's  taken  on  Lady  Sophy  because  she's  your 
friend.  It's  pitiful  —  it 's  unbelievable  to  see  her 
so  misjudged!  —  Take  me  from  you!  I've  never 
gone  there  but  she  's  asked  me  why  you  did  n't 
come.  She  still  sends  you  flowers  pretty  well  every 
day.  Those  are  hers,  I  see.  I  'm  glad  that  you  Ve 
deigned  to  put  them  in  water." 

The  tall  sheaf  of  carnations,  white  and  rose  and 
yellow,  that  stood  in  a  jug  on  a  shelf  in  the  studio 
must,  evidently,  have  come  from  Mrs.  Dallas's 
garden.  No  other  person  grew  such  carnations. 
The  garden  at  Ashleigh  Lodge,  this  pleasant 
country  house  that  they  had  taken  for  the  six 
summer  months,  was  not  its  strong  point,  and  Mrs. 
Dallas  had  kept  them  reinforced  from  her  abun 
dance.  Rupert  associated  the  carnations,  their  soft 
and  glowing  colours,  their  formal  grace  and  spicy 
sweetness,  with  the  whole  growth  of  his  devotion 
to  Mrs.  Dallas.  He  fixed  his  indignant  eyes  on 
them  now. 

"Of  course  I  put  them  into  water.  I  am  going 
to  arrange  them  and  take  them  into  the  drawing- 
room  presently,"  said  Marian  with  her  hateful 
calm.  "  But  they  give  me  no  more  pleasure.  Nor 
does  she.  She  is  like  them.  They  are  heartless 
flowers  and  she  is  a  heartless  woman.  I  see  quite 
plainly  now  what  I  did  n't  see  before.  She's  that 
type,  —  the  smiling,  calculating  siren.  She  lives 
for  admiration;  she's  herself  only  when  she  has 
some  one  at  her  feet,  and  she's  seen  to  it  that  you 

[  175  ] 


CARNATIONS 

should  be,  —  though  I  'm  bound  to  say  that  you 
have  n't  made  it  difficult  for  her.  It  fits  in  with  all 
the  stories." 

Rupert,  at  this,  turned  away  and  went  out.  He 
thrust  his  hat  firmly  down  on  his  fair  locks  and 
swung  his  stick  as  he  strode  by  the  little  footpath 
through  the  woods.  Bitter  disappointment  with 
Marian  surged  in  him,  and  hot  anger,  but  above  all 
an  atoning  tenderness  that  seemed  almost  to  break 
his  heart  in  its  longing  to  protect  and  justify  the 
woman  so  traduced  by  her.  His  head  throbbed 
and  drummed  as  he  went.  To  have  it  come  to  this ! 
To  have  such  hands  laid  on  it  —  their  love!  their 
silent,  hidden  love!  That  Mrs.  Dallas  returned 
his  love  he  seemed  to  see,  with  many  other  things, 
clearly,  rapturously,  if  with  trembling,  for  the  first 
time  to-day.  He  saw  it  with  Marian's  unwor- 
thiness;  Marian's  unworthiness  had  shown  it 
to  him;  and  now,  exulting,  he  claimed  it.  She 
loved  him,  veiling  the  depth  in  her  vagueness, 
her  aloofness,  her  indulgent  irony.  His  mind  re 
traced,  with  yearning  gratitude,  the  steps  of  their 
relationship.  No  one  had  ever  been  to  him  what 
she  was.  How  she  helped  and  lifted  him!  How 
juvenile  and  undiscriminating  in  their  happy  ac 
ceptances  were  Marian's  appreciations  of  his  work 
beside  Mrs.  Dallas's  half-idle  comments.  He  had 
read  through  to  her,  in  manuscript,  all  his  last 
novel;  and  Marian  had  not  seen  it  yet.  He  had  not 
wanted  to  read  it  to  Marian;  and  she,  besides,  had 
been  very  busy  with  her  painting. 

Mrs.  Dallas  had  listened  to  the  novel  almost 
every  day,  sitting  in  the  shade  of  her  veranda,  in 
her  white  dress,  with  the  hands  that,  unless  she 
were  gardening,  seemed  always  exquisitely  idle,  yet 


CARNATIONS 

that  in  their  idleness  seemed  to  dream  and  smile; 

—  he  could  see  the  white  skin,  the  delicate  finger 
tips,  the  pearls  and  rubies  slipping  down,  and  his 
heart  contracted  with  a  pang  and  ecstasy  as  he 
saw  himself  holding  her  hand,  kissing  it.   He  must 
kiss  it,  to-day,  and  he  must  tell  her.  For  she  needed 
him;  he  was  sure  of  it.    She  needed  him  terribly. 
If  she  lifted  him,  yet  how  much,  too,  he  could  lift 
her,  out  of  the  lethargic  shallows  and  sullen  quag 
mires  of  her  life. 

She  could  not  be  happy  with  her  husband.  He 
felt  himself  shut  his  eyes  before  the  retrospect  of 
what  the  disenchantments  and  disasters  must  be 
that  lay  behind  her.  If  she  had  taken  great  risks, 
with  that  heart  of  highest  courage  he  divined  in 
her,  if  she  had  faced  great  sacrifices  for  her  present 
husband,  what  wonder  that  her  loveliness  was  now 
clouded  by  that  irony  and  languor?  She  was  not 
kind  to  Colonel  Dallas;  he  could  not  hide  from  him 
self  that  she  was  not  kind  to  him;  but,  as  he  owned 
it,  he  yearned  over  her  with  a  deeper  comprehen 
sion  of  tenderness,  feeling  his  rights  the  greater. 
How  could  she  be  kind  to  the  selfish,  complaining, 
elegant  old  man  ?  —  for,  to  Rupert,  Colonel  Dallas's 
fifty-five  years  seemed  old.  She  never  said  anything 
actually  sharp  or  disagreeable  to  him  —  even  when 
he  was  at  his  most  fretful  and  tiresome;  but -when 
he  was  least  so  she  was  not  any  the  kinder,  and  by 
her  glances,  by  the  inflections  of  her  cool  and  indo 
lent  voice  in  answering  him,  she  displayed  to  the 
full,  to  others  and  to  himself,  did  he  take  the  pains 
to  see  it,  how  dull  and  how  tiresome  she  found 
him.  No;  she  was  like  a  weary,  naughty  child  in 
this;  and  seeing  her  as  a  child,  with  a  child's  faults 

—  and  did   it  not  prove  how   unblinded  his  love 


CARNATIONS 

must  be  that  he  should  see  it?  —  he  felt  himself 
fold  her  to  his  heart  in  a  tenderness  more  than  a 
lover's;  a  paternal  passion  was  in  it;  he  had  known 
that  it  must  be  in  true  love;  he  had  said  so  in  one 
of  his  books.  How  his  books  would  grow  from  his 
knowledge  of  her! 

II 

HE  had  now  passed  through  the  woods  and  crossed 
the  road  and  entered  the  footpath  that  ran  down  to 
Woodlands,  the  small  house  encircled  by  birch  and 
fir  woods  where,  for  now  some  four  or  five  years, 
the  Dallases  had  pitched  their  errant  tent.  One 
could  reach  it,  also,  by  the  road;  but  Rupert  always 
took  this  short  cut  that  brought  him  out  at  a  little 
gate  opening  on  the  upper  lawn.  There  was  an 
upper  and  a  lower  lawn  at  Woodlands;  on  the 
upper  Colonel  Dallas  had  a  putting-green;  the 
lower  was  a  tiny  square  surrounded  by  Mrs. 
Dallas's  beds  of  carnations.  Rupert,  when  he 
emerged  upon  the  putting-green,  could  look  down 
past  the  red-tiled  roofs  and  the  white  rough-cast 
walls  of  the  house  at  the  carnations,  massed  in  their 
appointed  colours  —  from  deep  to  palest  rose,  from 
fawn  and  citron  to  snowy  white  —  among  flagged 
paths. 

Mrs.  Dallas  had  told  him,  in  one  of  her  infrequent 
moments  of  communicativeness,  that  during  years 
of  wandering  as  a  soldier's  wife  —  her  first  hus 
band,  also,  had  been  a  soldier  —  she  had  come  to 
be  known  as  the  woman  who  could  make  things 
grow  anywhere.  She  had  grown  flowers  in  sands 
and  marshes.  She  had  snatched  it  might  be  but  the 
one  season  of  fulfilment  from  the  most  temporary 


CARNATIONS 

of  sojournings  —  in  China,  in  India,  in  Africa. 
Sometimes  only  bulbs  would  grow;  sometimes 
only  roses;  but  what  she  tried  for,  always,  and  had 
never  attained  in  more  perfection  than  at  Wood 
lands,  was  carnations.  They  were  her  favourite 
flower  and  they  atoned  to  her  here,  she  said,  for 
living  in  a  house  that  made  her  always  think  of  an 
ornamental  bottle  of  some  popular  dentifrice,  so 
red  and  white,  so  fresh  and  spick  and  span,  and 
with  such  a  well-advertised  air,  was  Woodlands. 
Her  carnations  were  the  only  things  of  which  he 
had  ever  heard  her  speak  with  feeling.  Rupert,  as 
he  looked  down  at  them  from  the  upper  lawn  and 
descended  the  stone  .steps,  felt  his  heart  beating 
violently. 

A  veranda  ran  along  the  front  of  Woodlands, 
and  Mrs.  Dallas  was  sitting  on  it,  just  outside  her 
drawing-room  windows.  The  shaded  depths  of  the 
room  behind  her  glimmered  here  and  there  with 
the  half-drowned  brightness  of  crystal,  porcelain, 
lacquer,  —  the  things,  none  very  good  but  all 
rather  charming,  that  she  had  picked  up  for  a  song 
in  the  course  of  her  wanderings;  and  she  sat  there, 
rather  like  a  siren  indeed,  at  the  mouth  of  her 
cavern,  its  treasures  seeming  to  shine  in  the  trans 
lucent  darkness  behind  her  as  if  through  water. 
Rupert,  remembering  and  accepting  the  simile,  saw 
her  as  a  siren,  a  creature  of  poetry  and  romance, 
though  he  recognized  that  her  poetry,  like  her 
romance,  was  hidden  from  the  ordinary  observer. 
Even  to  his  eyes  she  always  appeared  first  and  fore 
most  as  a  woman  of  extreme  fashion,  and  his  other 
perceptions  of  her  were  tinged  with  the  half-tor 
menting,  half-delicious  pungency  of  this  one,  for 
Rupert  had  known  till  now  no  women  of  fashion. 

[  179] 


CARNATIONS 

He  had  passed  his  youth,  until  going  to  Oxford,  in  a 
provincial  town,  where  his  father,  an  admirable 
and  sagacious  man,  was  a  hard-worked  doctor;  and 
his  only  glimpses  of  society  had  been  in  his  en 
counters,  always  displeasing  to  him,  with  Marian's 
tiresome  and  conventional  kinsfolk  and  the  few 
haphazard  contacts  in  London  that  came  in  the 
way  of  a  young  writer.  Mrs.  Dallas  might  embody 
poetry  and  romance,  but  she  also  embodied  luxury 
and  the  exercised  and  competent  economy  that 
made  it  possible.  She  might  have  to  live  in  small, 
gimcrack  Woodlands  and  do  without  a  motor; 
but  she  had  her  maid.  The  slices  of  bacon  at 
breakfast  were  carefully  computed;  but  the  coffee 
was  of  the  best  and  blackest. 

To-day,  as  always  when  he  had  seen  her,  she 
seemed  ready  for  any  possible  social  emergency. 
She  could  have  stepped  from  her  veranda,  with 
those  wonderfully  cut  little  white  shoes,  into  the 
smartest  of  garden-parties,  or  have  received  in  her 
shimmering  cavern  the  unexpected  visit  of  a  royal 
personage;  and  her  soft  white  linen  with  its  heavy 
Italian  embroideries  clotted,  like  thick  cream, 
about  the  hem  and  wrists  and  breast,  would  have 
been  as  exquisitely  appropriate  as  it  was  to  this 
empty  afternoon  of  reverie. 

She  was  a  small,  very  shapely  woman,  soft  and 
curved  and  compact.  Her  coiffure  would  have 
looked  old-fashioned  in  its  artifice  and  elegance, 
and  with  its  "  royal  fringe,"  were  it  not  for  its  air  of 
a  rightness  as  unquestionable  as  that  of  some  foreign 
princess's,  who  kept  and  did  not  follow  fashions. 
Mrs.  Dallas's  face,  too,  was  small  and  colourless 
and  slightly  faded;  her  hair  was  of  a  lighter  brown 
than  her  arched  eyebrows  and  her  melancholy  and 

\  1 80  1 


CARNATIONS 

dissatisfied  eyes;  her  eyelids,  tinged  with  a  dusky 
mauve,  drooped  heavily  and  made  her  always  look 
a  little  sleepy;  the  smiling  line  of  her  full-lipped  yet 
minute  mouth  was  ironic  rather  than  mirthful. 
To  have  called  it  a  bewitching  or  an  alluring  face 
would  have  been  to  imply  a  mobility  it  did  not 
possess;  but  it  was  potent  through  its  very  passivity; 
it  was  provocative  through  its  profound  and  slum 
brous  indifference. 

There  was  certainly  no  hint  of  allurement  in  the 
glance  she  turned  on  Rupert  Wilson  as  he  came 
round  the  corner  of  the  veranda;  it  was,  indeed, 
even  to  his  rapt  preoccupation,  a  little  harder  in  its 
quiet  attentiveness  than  usual;  yet  she  smiled  at 
him,  and  her  smile  was  always  sweet,  holding  out  a 
languid  hand  in  silence  and  leaving  it  to  him  to 
say,  "You  expected  me." 

It  was  hardly  a  question,  and  Mrs.  Dallas  gave 
it  no  answer.  He  had,  indeed,  come  to  see  her 
every  day  for  many  weeks  now.  But  yesterday 
had  finished  the  novel,  and  to-day  was  almost  the 
first  they  had  had  without  some  definite  pro 
gramme  of  reading. 

Rupert  sat  down  on  the  steps  of  the  veranda  at 
her  feet  and  took  off  his  hat  and  looked  out  across 
the  carnations;  and  since  she  said  nothing,  he,  too, 
was  silent,  and  to  his  trembling  young  heart  the 
silence  was  full  of  new  avowals. 

Colonel  Dallas's  smoking-room  also  opened  on 
the  veranda,  and  as  they  sat  there  he  came  out.  He 
was  a  tall,  heavy  man,  with  large  pale  cheeks 
drooping  on  either  side  of  a  white  moustache,  and 
a  gloomy  eye  that  could  become  fretful.  He  cast 
now  a  glance  that  was  only  gloomy  at  his  wife  and 
her  companion. 

[  181  1 


CARNATIONS 

"Beastly  hot  day,"  he  said,  to  her  rather  than 
to  Rupert.  "It's  worse  in  the  house  than  out,  I 
think." 

"Are  you  going  over  to  the  Trotters'  for  tea  and 
croquet?"  his  wife  inquired. 

"To  the  Trotters'?  Why  should  I  go  to  the 
Trotters'?" 

"They  asked  you,  and  you  accepted." 

"Well,  I  certainly  don't  feel  inclined  to  endure 
that  broiling  walk  for  the  sake  of  les  beaux  yeux  of 
Madame  Trotter  et  filles.  It's  a  dull  neighbour 
hood,  this,  but  the  Trotters  are,  perhaps,  when 
all's  done  and  told,  the  dullest  people  in  it." 

"You've  always  seemed  to  get  on  particularly 
well  with  them,  I've  thought,"  said  Mrs.  Dallas, 
in  the  voice  that  when  it  seemed  considerate  could 
contrive  to  be  most  disparaging.  "  It's  a  pity  not  to 
go.  You  need  a  walk.  You  can't  afford  Carlsbad 
this  year,  you  know." 

"I  need  hardly  be  reminded  of  that,"  said 
Colonel  Dallas,  and  now  it  was  fretfully.  "To 
run  the  risk  of  apoplexy  on  the  road  and  to  drink 
the  Trotters'  foul  Indian  tea  is  hardly  an  equiva 
lent.  No;  I  shall  practise  some  putting  shots,  and 
perhaps,  if  it  gets  cooler  towards  evening,  I'll  go 
over  to  the  links.  The  Trotters  can  manage  with 
out  me.  —  What  time  do  the  Varleys  arrive?" 

"At  seven-thirty.  There's  no  other  train  they 
could  arrive  by,  as  far  as  I'm  aware." 

The  colonel  looked  at  his  watch,  drew  his  hat 
down  over  his  eyes,  and  went  slowly  away  round 
the  corner  of  the  house. 

His  wife's  eyes  did  not  follow  him,  nor,  it  was 
evident,  her  thoughts. 

"It  has  been  rather  oppressive,  hasn't  it?"  said 

[  182] 


CARNATIONS 

Rupert,  glancing  up  at  her.  "You  have  n't  been 
feeling  it  too  much,  I  hope." 

"Not  at  all.  I  like  it.  I  think  it's  only  people 
who  don't  know  how  to  be  quiet  who  mind  the 
heat,"  said  Mrs.  Dallas.  "This  is  the  one  time  of 
the  year  that  one  can  sit  out  of  doors  in  a  thin 
dress,  and  I  am  very  grateful  for  it."  Even  about 
small  things  Mrs.  Dallas  always  seemed  to  have 
her  mind  quite  made  up.  Her  likes  and  dislikes, 
for  all  the  inertness  of  her  demeanour,  were  clear 
and  unshifting.  She  sometimes  made  Rupert  feel 
himself  amorphous,  vague,  uncertain;  and  this 
feeling,  though  blissful,  had  yet  its  sting  of  sadness 
and  anxiety. 

"Well,  some  people  are  n't  able  to  be  quiet,  are 
they?"  he  observed.  "On  a  day  like  this  I  always 
think  of  people  in  factories,  —  great,  roaring, 
clanking  places  with  the  sun  gnawing  at  their  iron 
roofs,  —  and  the  pale,  moist  faces,  the  monoto 
nously  rapid  hands." 

"Do  you?"  said  Mrs.  Dallas.  She  often  said 
that,  in  that  tone,  when  he  gave  expression  to  some 
enthusiasm  or  sympathy.  She  did  not  make  him 
feel  snubbed,  but  always,  when  she  said,  "Do 
you?"  she  made  him  feel  young  again,  a  little  be 
wildered  and  a  little  sad.  He  imagined,  to  explain 
it  in  her,  that  people's  thoughts  did  not  interest 
her,  her  woman's  intuition  probing  below  their 
thoughts  to  their  personalities.  It  was  he,  himself, 
with  his  heart  full  of  devotion,  that  interested  Mrs. 
Dallas.  Yet  it  was  not  of  him  that  she  next  spoke. 
"How  is  Marian?"  she  asked.  "Is  she  painting 
to-day?" 

He  was  aware  that  his  face  altered  and  that  his 
colour  rose.  He  had  to  steady  something,  in  his 

1 183 1 


CARNATIONS 

glance  and  in  his  voice,  the  pressure  of  his  new 
consciousness  was  so  great,  as  he  answered,  "Yes, 
she's  been  painting  all  the  morning." 

"I  have  n't  seen  her  for  some  days  now,"  Mrs. 
Dallas  remarked. 

"No."  The  longing  in  him  to  confide  in  her,  to 
pour  out  his  grief  and  his  devotion,  was  so  strong 
that  for  the  moment  he  could  find  only  the  simple 
negative. 

"I  quite  miss  Marian,"  Mrs.  Dallas  added. 

He  looked  down  at  the  little  foot  placed  on  a 
cushion  beside  him,  and  he  said,  "You've  always 
been  so  kind,  so  charming  to  Marian."  He  re 
membered  Marian's  words  with  a  deepened  wrath 
and  tenderness. 

"Have  I?  I'm  glad  you  think  so.  It's  been  very 
easy,"  said  Mrs.  Dallas. 

A  silence  fell. 

"May  I  talk  to  you?"  Rupert  jerked  out  sud 
denly.  "May  I  tell  you  things  I've  been  feeling? 
I  have  been  feeling  so  much  —  about  you  — 
about  myself.  —  I  long  to  tell  you." 

"By  all  means  tell  me,"  said  Mrs.  Dallas  with 
great  placidity;  and  one  could  see  that  she  had 
often  made  the  same  sort  of  reply  to  the  same  sort 
of  appeal. 

"You  know  what  you  have  been  to  me,"  said 
Rupert,  turning  on  the  step  so  that  he  could  look 
up  at  her.  "You  know  how  it's  all  grown  — 
beautifully,  inevitably.  No  one  has  ever  been  to 
me  what  you  are." 

Mrs.  Dallas's  sleepy  eyes  rested  on  him,  and  her 
delicate  nostrils,  slightly  dilating,  might  have  been, 
though  without  excitement,  inhaling  a  familiar 
incense. 


CARNATIONS 

"I  do  love  you  so  much,"  said  Rupert  In  a 
trembling  voice,  gazing  at  her;  "I  do  love  you. 
You  understand  what  I  mean.  You  know  me  now 
and  you  could  n't  misunderstand.  I  want  to  serve 
you.  I  want  to  help  you.  I  want  you  to  lean  on  me 
and  trust  me  —  to  let  me  be  everything  to  you 
that  I  can."  And  as  he  spoke  he  stretched  out  his 
hand  and  laid  it  on  her  hands  folded  in  her  lap. 

Mrs.  Dallas  let  it  lie  there,  and  she  looked  back 
at  him,  not  moved,  apparently,  but  a  little  grave. 
"No,  -I  don't  think  I  misunderstand  your  feeling," 
she  said  after  a  moment.  "Of  course  I've  seen  it 
plainly." 

"Yes,  yes,  I  knew  you  did. — And  that  you 
accepted  it,  —  dearest  —  loveliest  —  best."  He 
had  drawn  her  hand  to  him  now  and  he  pressed 
his  lips  upon  it.  And  as  he  kissed  Mrs.  Dallas's 
hand,  as  that  imagined  happiness  was  consum 
mated,  he  felt  his  mind  cloud  suddenly,  as  if  in 
a  cloud  of  fragrance,  and,  thought  sinking  away 
from  him,  he  knew  only  an  aching  sweetness,  the 
white,  warm  hand  against  his  lips,  the  darkness 
of  the  glimmering  room  near  by,  and  the  scent  of 
the  carnations,  exhaling  their  spices  in  the  hot 
sunshine.  Closing  his  eyes,  he  breathed  quickly. 
And  above  him,  a  little  paler,  Mrs.  Dallas,  for  a 
moment,  as  if  with  the  conscious  acceptance  of  a 
familiar  ritual,  also  closed  her  eyes  and  breathed 
in,  with  the  scent  of  her  carnations,  the  immortal 
fragrance  of  the  youth  and  passion  that,  to  her, 
could  soon  no  longer  come.  "Dear  boy!"  she  mur 
mured. 

They  heard  the  step  of  Colonel  Dallas  descend 
ing  from  the  upper  lawn.  Rupert  drew  back 
sharply;  Mrs.  Dallas  softly  replaced  her  hand 


CARNATIONS 

upon  the  other  in  her  lap.  Her  husband  appeared, 
and  he  looked  very  fretful. 

"The  sun  is  quite  tropical.  It's  impossible  to 
play  in  it.  We  don't  get  a  breath  of  air  down  in 
this  hole."  He  took  out  his  watch  —  Colonel 
Dallas  was  always  taking  out  his  watch.  "What 
time  is  tea?"  he  asked. 

"At  five  o'clock,  as  usual,  I  suppose,"  said  his 
wife. 

"It's  only  just  past  four,"  said  the  colonel,  with 
the  bitterly  resigned  air  of  one  who  loses  a  wager 
he  had  hardly  hoped  to  win.  "I  shall  go  to  the 
Trotters'.  It's  better  than  being  baked  in  this 
oven.  Their  lawn  is  shaded  at  all  events."  He 
spoke  as  if  there  had  been  some  attempt  to  dis 
suade  him  from  the  alleviations  of  the  Trotters' 
lawn. 

"I  don't  know  why  you  did  n't  go  half  an  hour 
ago,"  said  his  wife.  "You've  so  often  discovered 
that  the  sun  is  tropical  on  the  upper  lawn  at  this 
hour."  And  as  the  colonel  moved  off  she  added, 
"Just  tell  them  that  I'll  have  lemon-squash  in 
stead  of  tea,  will  you?" 

It  was  a  rather  absurd  little  interlude;  yet  it  had 
its  point,  its  appropriateness;  it  fitted  in  with 
those  thoughts  of  succour,  and  Rupert  tried,  now, 
to  recover  them,  saying,  after  the  gate  had  closed 
upon  the  colonel  and  keeping  still  at  his  little 
distance,  "Are  you  very  unhappy?" 

How  he  was  to  help  Mrs.  Dallas  except  by  lov 
ing  her  and  coming  to  see  her  every  day  and  being 
allowed  to  kiss  her  and  hold  her  hand  he  did  not 
clearly  know,  but  it  seemed  the  moment  for  re 
turning  to  those  offers  of  service.  He  did  not  at 
tempt  to  regain  her  hand.  Mingling  with  the  rap- 

[  186] 


CARNATIONS 

ture,  when  the  kiss  and  the  scent  of  the  carnations 
had  blurred  his  mind,  there  was  also  a  sense  of 
fear.  He  was  different;  and  there  was  more  in  his 
love  than  he  had  known. 

"Very  unhappy?  Not  more  than  most  people, 
I  suppose.  Why?"  Mrs.  Dallas  asked.  Her  tone 
was  changed.  Her  moment  of  diffusion,  of  languor 
and  acceptance,  was  gone  by. 

"Why?"  Rupert  felt  the  change  and  the 
question  hurt  him.  "When  that's  your  life?  — 
This?" 

"By  that,  do  you  mean  my  husband?"  Mrs. 
Dallas  inquired  kindly.  "He's  not  my  life.  As 
for  this  —  if  you  mean  my  situation  and  occupa 
tion  —  having  love  made  to  me  by  a  pleasant 
young  man  while  I  smell  carnations,  I  can  assure 
you  that  there's  nothing  I  enjoy  much  more." 

She  did  more  than  hurt  him  now;  she  astonished 
him.  "Don't!"  he  breathed.  It  was  as  if  some 
thing  beautiful  were  being  taken  from  him.  In 
stinctively  he  stretched  out  his  hand  for  hers  and 
again  she  gave  it;  but  now  she  looked  clearly  at 
him,  a  touch  of  malice  in  her  smile,  though  her 
smile  was  always  sweet. 

"Don't  what?" 

"Don't  pretend  to  be  hard  —  flippant.  Don't 
hide  from  me.  Give  yourself  to  the  real  beauty 
that  we  have  found." 

"I  have  just  said  that  I  enjoy  it." 

"Enjoy  is  not  the  word,"  said  Rupert,  in  a  low 
voice,  looking  down  at  the  hand  in  his.  "It's  an 
initiation.  A  dedication." 

"A  dedication?  To  what?"  Mrs.  Dallas  asked, 
and  even  more  kindly;  yet  her  kindness  made  her 
more  removed. 

[  187] 


CARNATIONS 

Her  words  seemed  to  strike  with  soft  yet  bruis 
ing  blows  upon  his  heart.  "To  life.  To  love,"  he 
answered. 

"And  what  about  Marian?"  Mrs.  Dallas  in 
quired.  And  now,  still  gently,  she  withdrew  her 
hand  and  leaned  her  cheek  on  it  as,  her  elbow  on 
the  cushions  of  her  chair,  she  bent  her  indolent  but 
attentive  gaze  upon  him.  "  I  should  have  thought 
that  dedication  lay  in  that  direction." 

His  forehead  was  hot  and  his  eyes,  hurt,  be 
wildered,  indignant,  challenged  hers  yet  suppli 
cated,  too.  "Please  don't  let  me  think  that  I'm 
to  hear  mean  conventionalities  from  you  —  as  I 
have  from  Marian.  You  know,"  he  said,  and  his 
voice  slightly  shook,  "that  dedication  is  n't  a 
limiting,  limited  thing.  You've  read  my  books 
and  cared  for  them,  and  understood  them,  — 
better,  you  made  me  feel,  that  I  did  myself,  —  so 
that  you  must  n't  pretend  to  forget.  Love  does  n't 
shut  out.  It  widens." 

"Does  it?"  said  Mrs.  Dallas.  "And  what,"  she 
added,  "were  the  mean  conventionalities  you 
heard  from  Marian?  I've  been  wondering  about 
Marian." 

"She  is  jealous,"  said  Rupert  shortly,  looking 
away.  "I  could  hardly  believe  it,  but  she  made  it 
too  plain.  It  seemed  to  take  the  foundation- 
stones  of  our  life  away  to  hear  her.  It  made  all  our 
past,  all  the  things  I  believed  we  shared,  seem 
illusory.  It  made  me  feel  that  the  Marian  I'd 
loved  and  trusted  was  a  stranger." 

Mrs.  Dallas  contemplated  his  averted  face,  and 
•as  she  heard  him  her  glance  altered.  It  withdrew 
itself;  it  veiled  itself;  it  became  at  once  less  kind 
and  more  indolent.  "And  you  really  don't  think 

[  188  ] 


CARNATIONS 

Marian  has  anything  to  complain  of?"  she  in 
quired  presently. 

"No,  I  do  not,"  said  Rupert.  "Nothing  is  taken 
from  her." 

"Isn't  it?  And  if  I  became  your  mistress, 
would  you  still  think  she  had  nothing  to  complain 
of?"  Mrs.  Dallas  asked  the  question  in  a  tone  of 
detached  and  impartial  inquiry. 

How  far  apart  in  the  young  man's  experience 
were  theory  and  practice  was  manifested  by  the 
hot  blush  that  sprang  to  his  brow,  the  quick  stare 
in  which  an  acute  eye  might  have  read  an  in 
genuous  and  provincial  dismay.  "My  mistress?" 
he  stammered.  "You  know  that  such  a  thought 
never  entered  my  head." 

"Has  n't  it?  Why  not?" 

"You  know  I  only  asked  to  serve  —  to  help  — 
to  care  for  you." 

"You  would  think  it  wrong,  then,  to  be  unfaith 
ful,  technically,  to  your  wife?" 

"Wrong?"  His  brow  showed  the  Saint-Ber 
nard-puppy  knot  of  perplexity.  "It's  not  a  ques 
tion  of  wrong.  Wrongness  lies  only  in  the  sort  of 
love.  Real  love  is  sacred  in  all  its  expressions  of 
itself;  my  ideal  of  love,  just  because  it  includes 
that  one,  can  do  without  it." 

"But,  on  your  theory,  why  should  it  do  with 
out  it?"  Mrs.  Dallas,  all  mildness,  inquired. 

His  mind  was  driven  back  to  those  questionings 
in  the  studio,  when  he  had  thought  of  the  incon 
gruous  yet  allied  themes  of  passion  and  perambu 
lators,  and  groped  again,  angrily,  in  the  same  ob 
scurity.  "It's  —  it's  —  a  matter  of  convenience," 
he  found,  frowning;  "it  —  it  would  n't  work  in  with 
other  beautiful  things.  It  would  n't  be  convenient." 

[  189  ] 


CARNATIONS 

"I'm  glad  to  hear  you  find  such  a  reasonable 
objection,"  said  Mrs.  Dallas.  "There  could  hardly 
be  a  better  one.  It  would  n't  be  at  all  convenient. 
Though,  I  gather,  if  it  could  be  made  convenient, 
you  still  think  that  Marian  would  have  nothing 
to  complain  of." 

"I  don't  know  why  you  are  trying  to  pin 'me 
down  like  this."  Rupert,  stooping,  gathered  some 
flakes  of  stone  from  the  path  and  scattered  them 
with  a  sharp  gesture  that  expressed  his  exaspera 
tion.  "You  know  what  I  believe.  Love  is  free, 
free  as  air  and  sunshine.  How  can  one  stop  one's 
self  from  loving?  Why  should  one?  And  if  our 
love,  yours  and  mine,  could  mean  that  complete 
relation,  then,  yes,  the  ideal  thing,  the  really  ideal 
thing,  would  be  for  Marian  to  feel  it  right  and 
beautiful  and  to  be  glad  that  there  should  be  two 
perfected  and  complete  relations  instead  of  one. 
As  it  is,  that  inclusive  vision  is  n't  asked  of  her." 

"She's  not,  in  fact,  to  be  asked  to  be  a  Mor 
mon,"  Mrs.  Dallas  remarked.  "All  that  she  has  to 
put  up  with  is  that  her  husband  should  be  in  love, 
platonically,  with  another  woman,  and  should 
have  ceased  to  be  in  love  with  her.  It's  hard,  you 
know,  when  some  one  has  been  in  love  with  you,  to 
give  it  up." 

"But  I  have  not  ceased  to  love  Marian!"  Ru 
pert  cried.  "Why  should  you  suppose  it?  My 
love  for  you  does  n't  shut  out  my  love  for  her.  It's 
a  vulgar  old  remnant  of  sexual  savagery  to  think  it 
does.  A  mother  does  n't  love  one  child  the  less  for 
loving  another.  Why  can't  people  purify  and  widen 
their  minds  by  looking  at  the  truth?  —  That  jeer 
about  Mormons  is  unworthy  of  you.  Marriage  is  a 
prison  unless  husband  and  wife  are  both  free  to  go 

[  190] 


CARNATIONS 

on  giving  and  growing.  What  does  love  mean  but 
growth?" 

Mrs.  Dallas's  eyes  had  drifted  away  to  her  beds 
of  carnations  and  they  now  rested  on  them  for  a 
little  while.  Rupert  took  up  his  hat  and  fanned 
himself.  He  was  hot,  and  very  miserable. 

"It  always  strikes  me,  when  I  hear  talk  like 
yours,"  said  Mrs.  Dallas  presently,  "that  it  is  so 
much  less  generous  and  noble  than  it  imagines  it 
self  to  be.  It's  the  man,  only,  who  frames  the 
new  code  and  the  man,  only,  who  is  to  enlarge 
himself  and  run  two  or  three  loves  abreast." 

"Not  at  all.  Marian  is  precisely  as  free  as  I  am 
to  love  somebody  else  a»s  well  as  me." 

"As  free?  Oh  no,"  said  Mrs.  Dallas,  laughing 
softly.  "Theoretically,  perhaps,  but  not  actually. 
Nature  has  seen  to  that.  When  women  have 
babies  and  lose  their  figures  it's  most  unlikely  that 
they'll  ever  be  given  an  opportunity  to  exercise 
their  freedom.  That  fact  in  itself  should  make  you 
reconsider  your  ideas  about  love.  Own  frankly 
that  they  apply  only  to  men  and  don't  pretend  to 
generosity.  The  only  free  women  are  the  femmes 
galantes;  and  you'll  observe  that  they  are  seldom 
burdened  with  a  nursery,  and  that  they  never 
grow  fat." 

She  touched,  with  an  accuracy  malignant  in  its 
clairvoyance,  his  subconscious  awareness  of  Ma 
rian's  physical  alteration.  Something  in  him  shrank 
away  from  her  in  fear  and  indignation.  She  was 
trying  to  make  him  see  things  from  a  false  and 
petty  standpoint,  the  standpoint  of  a  woman  of 
the  world,  a  mere  woman  of  the  world  —  that 
world  of  shameful  tolerances  and  cruel  stupidi 
ties.  "I  don't  know  anything  about  femmes 


CARNATIONS 

galantes"  he  said,  "nor  do  I  wish  to.  You  mis 
understand  me  if  you  think  that  by  love  I  mean 
sensuality." 

With  slightly  lifted  brows  she  looked  out  at  the 
carnations;  and  had  she  been  angry  with  him  he 
could  have  felt  less  angry  with  her.  He  was,  in 
deed,  very  angry  with  her  when  she  remarked, 
tranquilly,  "  I  don't  think  you  know  what  you 
mean  by  love." 

"  I  mean  by  love  what  Shelley  meant  by  it," 
Rupert  declared. 

"  True  love  in  this  differs  from  gold  and  clay,  \ 
That  to  divide  is  not  to  take  away. 
Love  is  like  understanding  that  grows  bright 
Gazing  on  many  truths. 

"I  mean  what  all  the  true,  great  hearts  of  the 
world  have  meant  by  it,  —  poetry,  rapture,  reli 
gion;  and  they  can  only  be  sustained,  renewed, 
created,  by  emotion,  by  passion,  by  sexual  passion 
—  if  you  like  to  call  it  by  a  name  you  imagine  to 
be  derogatory."  He  felt  himself  warmed  and  sus 
tained  against  the  menace  that  emanated  from 
her  by  the  sound  of  his  own  familiar  eloquence. 

But  Mrs.  Dallas  still  tranquilly  contemplated 
the  carnations. 

"That's  the  man's  point  of  view.  The  view  of 
the  artist,  the  creator.  Perhaps  there's  truth  in  it. 
Perhaps  he  can't  write  his  poems  and  paint  his 
pictures  without  taking  intoxicants.  But  it  will 
never  be  the  view  of  the  woman.  Mary  Shelley 
will  never  really  like  it  when  Shelley  makes  love  to 
Jane  Clairmont;  Marian  will  never  like  it  when 
you  make  love  to  me.  They'll  try  to  believe  it's 
the  ideal,  to  please  him,  when  they  are  the  ones  he 

1 192] 


CARNATIONS 

is  in  love  with;  but  when  he  is  in  love  with  other 
women  they  won't  go  on  believing." 

"That  is  their  fault,  their  littleness,  then.  The 
wide,  glorious  outlook  is  theirs,  too,  if  they  choose 
to  open  their  eyes.  I  don't  accept  your  antithesis 
for  women,  —  humdrum  respectability,  roast  mut 
ton,  milk  pudding,  or  dissipation.  I  don't  believe 
that  when  a  woman  marries  and  becomes  a  mother 
she  must  turn  her  back  on  love." 

Mrs.  Dallas  at  this  began  to  laugh,  unkindly. 
"Turn  her  back  on  love?  No  indeed.  Why  should 
she?  Has  n't  she  her  husband  and  children,  to  say 
nothing  of  her  friends,  her  father  and  mother,  her 
sisters  and  brothers?  You  idealists  seem  always  to 
forget  these  means  of  expansion.  By  love  you  mean 
simply  and  solely  the  intoxicant.  Call  it  poetry 
and  religion,  if  you  like,  but  don't  expect  other 
people,  who  merely  see  that  you  are  intoxicated, 
to  call  it  that." 

He  sat,  trying  to  think.  Idly,  half  absently, 
with  languid  fingers,  she  seemed  to  be  breaking  his 
idols  as  though  they  had  been  silly  little  earthen 
ware  figures,  not  good  enough  —  here  was  the 
stab,  the  bewilderment  —  for  her  drawing-room. 
And  who  was  she  to  do  it,  this  remote,  mysterious 
creature,  steeped  in  the  perfume  of  her  passionate 
past?  He  felt  as  he  gazed  at  her  that  it  was  not 
only  himself  he  must  defend  against  her. 

"It's  curious  to  me  to  hear  you  talk  in  this 
way."  He  armed  himself,  as  he  spoke,  with  all  that 
he  could  muster  of  wisdom  and  of  weight.  "You 
are  the  last  woman  I'd  have  expected  to  hear  it 
from.  You've  made  me  your  friend,  so  that  I'd 
have  a  right  to  be  frank,  even  if  you  had  n't  let  me 
love  you.  What  right  have  you  to  turn  your  back 

[  193  J 


CARNATIONS 

on  all  the  beauty  and  romance  of  life  —  to  smile 
at  them  and  mock  them  ?  You  have  n't  allowed 
yourself  to  be  bandaged  and  crippled  by  conven 
tion,  I'm  sure  of  it.  You  have  followed  your  heart 

—  bravely,  truly  —  out  into  life.    You  have  loved 

—  and  loved  —  and  loved  —  I  know  it.  It  breathes 
from  you.    It's  all  you've  lived  for.'* 

"And  you  think  the  result  so  satisfactory?" 
said  Mrs.  Dallas.  She  looked  at  him  now,  and  if  it 
was  with  irony  it  was  with  sadness.  She  turned 
from  her  question.  "Well,  if  you  like,  I  am  one  of 
the  femmes  galantes;  they  are  of  many  types,  you 
know;  I  was  n't  thinking,  when  I  shocked  you  so, 
of  the  obvious,  gross  type.  I  was  thinking  of  the 
woman  who  corresponds  to  you  —  the  idealist, 
the  spiritual  femme  galante.  And,  I'm  convinced 
of  it,  for  a  woman,  it  does  n't  work.  A  man,  if  he  is 
a  big  man,  or  has  a  big  life,  —  it  is  n't  always  the 
same  thing  by  the  way,  —  may  have  his  succession 
of  passions,  or,  as  you'd  claim,  —  and  I  don't 
believe  it,  —  his  contemporaneities;  he  has  a  con 
text  to  frame  them  in;  they  may  fall  into  place. 
But  a  woman's  life  can't  be  calculated  in  those 
terms  of  dimension.  It  is  big  enough  for  the 
emotion  that  leads  to  marriage  and  to  the  loves 
that  grow  from  that,  the  loves  you  think  so  little  of. 
It  is  an  emotion  that  can't  be  repeated  over  and 
over  again,  simply  because,  in  a  normal  life,  it  has 
grown  into  something  else,  something  even  better, 
I  should  say:  a  form  of  poetry  and  rapture  and  re 
ligion  quite  compatible  with  roast  mutton  and  re 
spectability.  But  the  women  who  miss  the  normal 
life  and  who  try  to  live  on  the  emotions,  they  •*- 
well,  I  can  only  say  that  to  my  mind  they  always 
come  to  look  silly.  Silly  is  the  only  word  for  them." 

[  194  1 


CARNATIONS 

He  stared  at  her.   "You  don't  look  silly." 

"Why  should  I?"  Mrs.  Dallas  asked.  "I'm  not 
of  the  idealist  type.  I  don't  confuse  intoxication 
with  religion  and  think  I  have  the  one  when  I  Ve 
only  the  other.  I  may  have  missed  the  real  thing, 
but  I've  not  repeated  the  emotion  that  ought  to 
lead  to  it.  You  are  quite  mistaken  in  imagining 
that  I  Ve  loved  and  loved  and  loved.  I  have  n't. 
I  have  allowed  other  people  to  love  me.  That,  as 
you  '11  own,  is  a  very  different  matter.  I  am  hard  and 
cold  and  disillusioned.  I  am  not  soft  and  yearning 
and  frustrated.  Why  should  I  look  silly?" 

He  stared  at  her,  and  his  heart  was  flooded  with 
pain.  What  was  she,  then?  What  was  her  feeling 
for  him?  What  had  she  meant?  As  she  spoke  and 
as  he  looked  at  her,  the  veil  of  romance  dissolved 
from  about  her  and  he  saw  her  for  the  first  time 
with  her  own  eyes,  —  devoid  of  poetry,  a  hard, 
cold,  faded,  worldly  woman.  Yet  she  was  still  a 
Sphinx,  strange  and  alluring,  and  still  he  struggled 
against  her,  for  her,  saying  hotly,  though  his  heart 
was  chilled,  "If  it's  true,  you've  hurt  yourself  — 
you've  hurt  yourself  horribly,  through  fear  of 
looking  silly." 

"No,  I've  not  hurt  myself,"  said  Mrs.  Dallas. 
"I've  been  hurt,  perhaps;  but  I've  not  allowed  my 
hurts  to  repeat  themselves  too  often.  Some  things 
in  life  should  be  unique  and  final.  The  people  who 
don't  keep  them  so  become  shoddy.  Marian,  for  in 
stance,  is  neither  hard  nor  cold,  nor  shoddy  either. 
You  have  made  one  of  the  mistakes  that  idealists 
are  always  making  in  imagining  that  she  was  hum 
drum  respectability  and  that  I  was  poetry  and 
rapture  and  religion.  —  Oh,  it's  no  good  protest 
ing.  If  I  had  a  double  chin  and  thin  hair  you'd 

1 195 1 


CARNATIONS 

never  have  wanted  to  help  my  soul,  however  un 
happy  I  was.  And  if  Marian  had  sat  about  in 
carefully  chosen  clothes  and  looked  mysterious 
and  not  let  you  feel  sure  that  she  cared  about  you, 
you  would  probably  have  remained  in  love  with 
her.  So  please  own  that  you  have  been  mistaken 
and  that  on  the  one  side  is  love,  the  love  that 
Marian  feels  for  you,  although  she  knows  you; 
because  she  knows  you;  and  on  the  other  is  illusion, 
intoxication,  sensuality;  yes,  my  dear  Rupert,  such 
as  you  felt  when  I  let  you  kiss  my  hand  a  little 
while  ago." 

He  sat,  sullen,  even  sulky,  half  turned  from  her, 
and  again  he  stooped  and  gathered  up  the  flakes  of 
stone  and  tossed  them  away  down  the  path. 

The  clink  and  chink  of  ice  and  glass  was  heard 
approaching  through  the  drawing-room,  and  the 
maid  stepped  out  bearing  the  tray,  which  she  set 
down  on  a  wicker  table  before  her  mistress.  The 
tall  crystal  jug,  veiled  in  frosty  rime,  showed  tones 
of  jade  and  chalcedony,  and  fillets  of  lemon  peel 
threaded  it  like  pale,  bright  enamel.  This  gem- 
like  beaker,  the  plate  of  golden  cakes,  with  the 
scent  of  the  carnations,  with  Mrs.  Dallas's  little 
foot  on  its  cushion,  with  her  rings  of  pearl  and 
ruby,  had  all  been  part  of  the  magic  she  had  meant 
to  him.  The  very  sound  of  the  ice,  dully  yet 
resonantly  chinking,  brought  a  suffocating  sense 
of  nostalgia.  It  was  over,  all  over.  He  was  dis 
enchanted.  She  was  cruel  to  him,  to  him  who  had 
loved  her.  She  had  cut  into  him  and  killed  bright, 
ingenuous,  trustful  things.  And,  in  a  placid  voice, 
she  asked  him  if  he  would  have  some  cake,  and 
filled  his  glass. 

He  took  it  from  her  and  drank  it  off  in  silence. 

[  196] 


CARNATIONS 

The  icy,  aromatic  liquid  seemed  an  antidote  to 
that  other  intoxicant  she  had  mocked.  Irony 
flowed  through  his  veins;  a  bitter-sweet  sense  of 
vengeful  maturity.  When  he  set  down  the  glass, 
he  looked  up  at  her,  and  he  felt  himself  measuring 
his  sword  against  the  stiletto  of  an  adversary. 

"Well,  I've  had  my  lesson,"  he  said.  "I've 
been  a  generous  but  deluded  idealist,  it  seems,  in 
imagining  that  men  and  women  are  equals  in  their 
claims  on  life.  Since  I'm  an  artist,  I  have  a  right 
to  my  raptures,  I  take  it.  And  poor  Marian  must 
be  jealous  with  reason.  Well,  well;  it's  an  odd 
morality  to  hear  preached." 

Mrs.  Dallas  still  sipped  her  lemonade  and  she 
quietly  considered  him.  She  said  nothing,  and 
even  after  she  had  finished  and  set  down  her  glass 
she  sat  for  still  a  little  while  in  silence. 

"I'm  sorry  I've  seemed  to  preach,"  she  then 
remarked,  "and  I  certainly  think  that  Marian 
has  every  reason  to  be  jealous.  What  more  did  I 
say?  That  a  man  is  n't  as  ridiculous  and  undigni 
fied  as  a  woman  when  he  falls  in  and  out  of  love- 
affairs  on  the  condition  that  he  has  a  big  life? 
That  was  it,  was  n't  it?" 

"That  was  it,  and  I'm  glad  to  have  your  assur 
ance  that  I  am  in  no  danger  of  being  ridiculous  or 
undignified." 

"Do  you  mean,"  said  Mrs.  Dallas,  looking  at 
him,  "that  you  think  yours  such  a  big  life?" 

It  had  been,  before,  his  heart,  its  tenderness,  its 
devotion  and  dedication,  that  she  had  cut  into; 
it  was  into  something  deeper  now,  something  more 
substantially  and  vitally  at  the  centre  of  his  life, 
something  of  which  his  heart  and  all  its  ardours 
were  but  tributaries.  He  was  to  learn  that  self- 

[  197] 


CARNATIONS 

love  could  bleed  with  a  fiercer,  darker  gush.  The 
blood,  as  if  foretelling  his  ordeal,  sprang  to  his 
forehead  as  he  looked  back  at  her. 

"I  have  my  art,"  he  said,  and  he  disdained  any 
pretended  humility;  he  spoke  with  pride  and  even 
with  solemnity.  "I  live  for  my  art.  I  don't  think 
that  I  am  an  insignificant  man." 

"Don't  you?"  said  Mrs.  Dallas.  It  was  with  an 
unaffected  curiosity  that  her  eyes  rested  on  him, 
and  it  sank  into  him,  drop  by  drop,  like  poison. 
"Not  insignificant,  perhaps,"  she  took  up  after  a 
moment.  "That's  not  quite  the  word,  perhaps. 
You  are  very  intelligent  and  appreciative  and  good- 
hearted.  I  don't  suppose  one  can  be  quite  insignifi 
cant  if  one  is  that.  But  —  do  you  call  it  art,  your 
writing?  I  wonder.  Oh,  you  are  quite  right  to  live 
for  it,  of  course,  just  as  other  men  do  for  stock- 
broking  or  fox-hunting  or  print-collecting,  or  any 
thing  else  that  employs  their  energies  or  satisfies 
their  tastes  or  brings  in  money;  but,  to  count  as  art, 
a  man's  activities  must  mean  more  than  just  his 
own  satisfaction  in  them,  must  n't  they?  You  write 
careful,  intelligent,  sentimental  little  books;  but 
I  can't  feel  that  the  world  would  be  any  the  poorer 
if  you  were  to  take  to  stock-broking  or  fox-hunting 
instead.  No,  it  does  n't  seem  to  me,  my  dear 
Rupert,  that  your  life  is  nearly  large  enough  for  a 
succession  of  love-affairs.  It's  all  right  when  one  is 
young  and  looking  for  a  mate;  experiments  are  in 
order  then;  but  you've  found  your  mate,  and 
you'll  soon  be  not  so  very  young,  and  if  on  the 
strength  of  your  art  you  imagine  yourself  entitled 
to  unseasonable  intoxications,  you'll  become,  in 
time,  an  emotional  dram-drinker,  one  of  those 
foolish  old  inebriates  we  are  all  familiar  with,  and 

[  198] 


CARNATIONS 

you'll  spoil  yourself  for  what  you  were  meant  to  be 
and  can  be,  —  a  devoted  husband  and  an  excellent 
pere  de  famille" 

Stretched  on  his  rack,  broken,  bleeding,  Rupert 
stared  at  her.  Who  was  this  woman,  this  cruel, 
ambiguous  woman  who  watched  his  agony  with 
deliberating,  drowsy  eyes?  There  came  into  his 
mind  the  memory  of  a  picture  seen  in  childhood, 
some  sentimental  print  that  had  strongly  im 
pressed  his  boyish  sensibilities.  A  corner  of  a 
Roman  amphitheatre,  a  rising  tier  of  seats;  sham 
architecture,  sham  Romans,  no  doubt,  and  a  poor 
piece  of  claptrap,  looked  back  on  from  his  maturity; 
but  the  face  of  the  Roman  woman,  leaning  so 
quietly  forward  under  its  gold  tiara,  to  watch, 
unmoved,  the  tormented  combatants  below,  was  it 
not  like  this  face?  Yes,  she  was  of  that  stony 
hearted  breed,  unaltered  by  the  centuries. 

The  torment  of  his  humiliation  snatched  at 
anger  for  a  veil.  He  said,  smiling,  "  You  have  been 
very  successful  till  now  in  concealing  your  real 
opinion  of  me." 

"Have  I  concealed  it?" 

"My  work  certainly  seemed  to  be  of  absorbing 
interest  to  you." 

"I  listened  to  it;  yes." 

"I  did  n't  imagine  you'd  stoop  to  feign  interest. 
I  did  n't  imagine  you'd  take  such  pains  to  allure 
and  flatter  a  commonplace  young  pere  de  famille" 

"Did  I  take  pains  to  allure  and  flatter  him?" 

"From  the  first!  —  From  the  very  first!  —  That 
day  we  met !  —  My  God ! "  Even  now  he  could  not 
help  feeling  himself,  seeing  himself,  as  one  of  his 
own  heroes;  and,  for  a  moment,  he  bent  his  head 
upon  his  hands  —  as  they  would  have  done  had  a 

[  199  1 


CARNATIONS 

calamity  as  unimaginable  as  this  befallen  them. 
"That  first  day!  —  The  apple-blossoms  framing 
you!  You  stood  under  your  white  parasol  in  our 
orchard  —  and  you  smiled  at  me!" 

"I  generally  do  at  agreeable-looking  young  men 
when  I  see  that  they  admire  me,"  Mrs.  Dallas 
commented. 

"Oh,  don't  pretend!  — Don't  hide  and  shift!" 
He  lifted  fierce  eyes.  "It  was  n't  only  that.  You 
seemed  to  care.  You  seemed  to  need  me.  You  made 
it  easy  —  inevitable.  You  came  —  and  came;  and 
you  asked  me  here  again  and  again." 

"Not  'me,'  —  'us,":  Mrs.  Dallas  amended 
suavely.  She  was  looking  at  him,  all  this  time, 
with  that  thoughtful,  poisonous  curiosity;  and  as 
he  now  sat,  finding  for  the  moment  no  words,  his 
fury  baffled  by  her  quiet  checkmating,  she  went  on, 
"And  afterwards  I  let  you  come  alone  because  I 
saw  that  you  admired  me,  and  that  is  always 
pleasant  to  me.  When,  at  first,  as  you  say,  I 
showed  myself  so  affable,  it  was  because  I  liked 
Marian.  I  do  still  like  her;  more  than  I  ever  liked 
you,  my  dear  Rupert;  if  you  are  good-hearted  and 
intelligent,  she  is  more  so,  and  she  has  more  sense 
of  humour  than  you  have,  and  does  n't  take  her 
self  so  seriously.  And,  to  be  quite  frank,  since  we 
are  talking  it  all  out  like  this,  I  not  only  liked 
Marian,  but  saw  that  she  could  be  of  use  to  me. 
I've  had,  in  some  ways,  a  tiresome,  tangled  life, 
and  things  have  n't  always  gone  as  I  wanted  them 
to  go,  so  that  I  don't  let  opportunities  for  strength 
ening  and  straightening  here  and  there  pass  me  by. 
Through  Marian  I  met  several  people  I  wanted  to 
meet  and  make  sure  of.  People  useful  to  me.  I 
think  Marian  quite  understood  and  quite  wanted 

[   200} 


CARNATIONS 

to  help.  She  would.  She  is  of  my  world  in  a  sense 
you  are  n't,  you  know,  my  dear  Rupert.  And,  in  my 
idle  way,  I  did  take  a  good  deal  of  trouble  to  be 
agreeable  to  her.  It  all  turned  out  exceedingly  well 
and  I  was  very  grateful  to  Marian.  That's  one 
reason,  you  see,  why  I  felt  to-day  that  our  little 
flirtation  was  going  too  far  and  must  be  put  a  stop 
to.  I  don't  want  Marian  to  be  jealous  of  me;  it 
would  be  distinctly  inconvenient.  But  there  is 
more  in  it  than  that.  I  would  n't  have  put  myself 
to  this  bother  and  talked  things  out  like  this  if  it 
had  n't  been  because  of  my  liking  for  Marian.  It 
makes  me  angry  to  see  that  you  don't  know  how 
lucky  you  are  to  have  such  a  wife.  I  want  you  to 
see  how  very  lucky  you  are.  I  want  you  to  see 
yourself  as  others  see  you,  —  a  very  unimpor 
tant  young  man,  without  position  and  without 
money,  married  to  a  quite  unusually  delightful  girl 
who  has  both.  This  is  n't  the  young  man's  fault, 
of  course;  one  would  n't  like  him  the  less  for  it;  but 
one  does  expect  him  to  be  aware  of  his  own  felicity. 
One  does  expect  him  to  feel  that,  at  present,  his 
wife  is  too  good  for  him.  I  don't  mean  in  the  con 
ventional  sense;  one  would  n't  ask  him  to  recognize 
that;  but  in  the  sense  of  worth  and  charm  and 
distinction,  for  those  are  the  things  he  supposes 
himself  to  care  for." 

She  had,  while  she  spoke  of  the  "young  man" 
thus  impartially,  turned  her  eyes  from  him,  and 
they  rested  again  on  the  beds  of  carnations.  The 
sun  had  sunk  behind  the  hill,  and  though  the  bright 
soft  colours  were  unshadowed,  they  all  lay  in  a 
different  light  and  seemed  to  glow  coolly  in  their 
own  radiance,  like  jewels. 

Rupert  rose.    His  anger  had  passed  from  him. 

[  201    ] 


CARNATIONS 

He  no  longer  felt  Mrs.  Dallas  to  be  an  antagonist; 
but  he  felt  her  to  be  a  stranger;  and  he  felt  himself 
to  be  a  stranger.  A  sense  of  fear  and  loneliness  and 
disembodiment  had  fallen  upon  him  while  he 
listened  to  her.  He  held  out  his  hand  to  her. 
"Good-bye,"  he  said.  "I  think  I  must  be  going." 

She  took  his  hand  and  looked  up  at  him  with  the 
gaze  so  remote,  so  irrevocable.  "  Good-bye,"  she 
said;  "I  hope  to  see  you  and  Marian  some  day 
soon,  perhaps." 

The  words,  with  their  quiet  relapse  on  conven 
tion,  made  him  feel  himself  in  a  new  world.  He 
had  been  thinking  of  final,  fatal  things,  things 
dark  and  trenchant;  she  showed  him  compromise, 
continuity,  commonplace  good  sense;  and,  dis 
possessed,  bereft  as  he  was,  something  in  him 
struggled  to  place  itself  beside  her  in  this  alien 
atmosphere,  to  make  itself  a  denizen  of  the  new 
since  he  had  forever  lost  the  old  world. 

"Oh  yes,  I'll  tell  her,"  he  said.  And  as  he  re 
leased  her  hand  he  found,  "Thank  you.  I'm  sure 
you  meant  it  all  most  kindly." 

"It's  very  nice  of  you  to  say  so,"  said  Mrs. 
Dallas,  smiling.  * 

It  was  the  world  of  convention;  yet  with  all  his 
bewildered  groping  for  clues  and  footholds,  he 
felt,  dimly,  as  a  glimmer  before  his  eyes  or  a  frail 
thread  in  his  hands,  that  the  smile  was  perhaps 
the  most  sincerely  sweet  that  he  had  ever  had  from 
Mrs.  Dallas.  It  was  as  if  she  saw  his  struggle  and 
commended  it. 

Ill 

HE  walked  away,  up  the  steps,  across  the  putting- 
green  and  out  into  the  woods.  He  went  slowly  as 

[202] 


CARNATIONS 

he  began  the  gradual  ascent.  He  felt  very  tired,  as 
though  he  had  been  beaten  with  rods,  and  there 
'was  in  him  a  curious  mingling  of  confusion  and 
lucidity,  of  pain  and  contemplation.  The  present 
and  the  future  were  curtained  with  shame,  uncer 
tainty,  and  dismay;  but  the  past  was  vivid,  and, 
like  a  singular,  outgrown  husk,  he  seemed  to  look 
back  at  that  Rupert  on  the  veranda,  so  blind,  so 
bland,  so  fatuous,  and  to  see  him  as  Mrs.  Dallas 
had  seen  him. 

Beyond  the  curtain  was  Marian.  He  knew  that 
he  went  towards  Marian  as  if  towards  safety  and 
succour;  yet  all  was  opaque  before  his  eyes,  for  who 
was  it  that  Marian  was  to  succour  but  that  fatu 
ous  Rupert?  and  was  it  for  such  as  he  that  he  could 
seek  support?  How  could  he  go  to  Marian  and  say, 
"I  have  been  given  eyes  to  see  you  as  you  are;  help 
me,  now,  to  be  blind  again  to  what  I  am."  No;  he 
could  not,  if  he  were  to  follow  his  glimmer  and  hold 
his  thread,  seek  succour  from  Marian. 

When  he  reached  the  house  he  went  into  the 
drawing-room  and  found  her  sitting  there  in  a  cool 
dress,  a  book  upon  her  knee.  She  did  not  see  him 
as  he  entered  quietly  and  he  stood  for  some 
moments  in  the  doorway  looking  at  her. 

She  had  been  crying;  her  cheeks  were  white  and 
her  eyelids  heavy;  but  though  this  perception  came 
to  him  with  a  blow  of  feeling,  it  did  not,  for  the 
moment,  move  him  from  his  contemplation  of  her, 
with  all  that  it  brought  of  new  and  strange  to  the 
familiar. 

She  was  strange,  though  she  was  not  a  stranger, 
as  he  had  become  to  himself.  He  noted  the  black 
curves  of  her  hair,  the  ample  line  of  her  bosom, 
the  gentle,  white  maternal  hand  laid  along  the 

[203  j 


CARNATIONS 

book.  On  a  cabinet,  above  her  head,  he  saw  that 
she  had  very  beautifully  arranged  the  white,  rose 
and  yellow  carnations.  It  was  like  her  to  do  this 
justice  to  her  rival's  gift;  like  her  to  place  them 
there  not  only  faithfully  but  beautifully.  And  as 
she  sat,  unaware  of  him,  in  the  luminous  evening 
air,  he  felt  her  to  be  full  of  enchantment  and  this 
enchantment  to  centre  in  the  hand  laid  along  the 
book.  His  eyes  fixed  themselves  on  the  hand.  It 
seemed  a  symbol  of  the  Marian  of  grace  and  girl 
hood  whom  he  had  loved  with  such  ardent  presage 
of  eternal  faith,  and  of  this  Marian  sitting  quietly 
in  her  saddened  and  accepted  life,  not  changed 
except  in  so  far  as  she  was  yet  more  worthy  of 
fidelity.  He  saw  that  she  had  passed  through  her 
ordeal  and  transcended  it;  he  saw  that  she  would 
never  again  show  him  jealousy;  and  he  saw  that  as 
the  old  Marian  he  had,  perhaps,  forever  lost  her. 
A  lover  must  always  show  jealousy.  This  was  a 
wife,  maternal  and  aloof. 

He  came  into  the  room  and  she  looked  round  at 
him.  Her  eyes,  altered  by  weeping,  were  mild  and 
alien.  They  were  without  hostility,  without  accu 
sation;  deliberating,  gentle;  the  eyes  of  a  wife. 
"Did  you  have  a  nice  afternoon?"  she  asked  laying 
down  her  book.  "  It's  been  delicious,  has  n't  it?" 

Quite  as  irrevocably  as  Mrs.  Dallas  she  made  the 
world  that  he  must  enter.  She,  too,  in  her  different 
way,  a  way  founded  on  acceptance  rather  than 
rejection,  showed  him  compromise  and  continuity. 
And  nothing  that  Mrs.  Dallas  had  said  to  him  cut 
into  him  so  horribly  as  to  see  Marian  show  him  this 
new  world. 

An  impulse  came  to  fall  on  his  knees  beside  her, 
bury  his  head  in  her  lap,  and  pour  out  all  his 

[  204  ] 


CARNATIONS 

griefs.  But  already,  and  for  Marian's  sake,  now, 
he  had  learned  a  better  wisdom.  To  fall  and  weep 
and  confess  would  be,  again,  to  act  like  one  of  his 
own  heroes;  and  Marian,  in  her  heart,  knew  all  that 
there  was  to  know  of  that  old  Rupert.  He  must 
make  her  now  know,  and  make  himself  know,  a 
new  Rupert. 

He  sat  down  opposite  her  and,  smiling  a  little,  he 
said,  "Mrs.  Dallas  has  done  with  me." 

"Done  with  you!"  Marian  repeated.  Her  faint 
colour  rose. 

"Quite,"  said  Rupert,  nodding;  "in  any  way  I'd 
thought  she  had  me." 

"Do  you  mean,"  said  Marian,  after  a  moment, 
"that  she's  been  horrid  to  you?" 

"Not  in  the  least,  though  it  felt  horrid.  She 
merely  let  me  see  that  I'd  been  mistaken." 

"Mistaken?   In  what  way?" 

"In  almost  every  way.  In  my  ideas  about  my 
self,  and  about  life,  and  about  her.  —  It  was  n't, 
for  one  thing,  me  she  liked  in  particular,  at  all. 
It  was  you." 

Marian's  flush  had  deepened.  "She  seemed  to 
like  you  very  much  indeed." 

"Only  frivolously;  not  seriously.  She  showed  me 
to-day  how  silly  I'd  been  to  think  it  anything  but 
frivolous.  She  made  me  see  that  I'd  been  a  serious 


ass." 


Marian  sat  looking  at  him.  She  was  startled,  and 
on  his  behalf  —  wonderful  maternal  instinct!  —  she 
was  angry;  yet  —  he  saw  it  all  in  the  sweet,  subtle 
alteration  of  her  face  —  she  was  happy,  half  incred 
ulously  yet  marvelously  happy.  And  as  he  saw  her 
happiness,  tears  came  to  Rupert's  eyes  and  he  felt 
himself,  deeply  and  inarticulately,  blessing  Mrs. 

[  205  ] 


CARNATIONS 

Dallas.  She  had  b^en  right.  This  was  something 
"even  better." 

"She's  an  exceedingly  clever  woman,"  he  said, 
smiling  at  Marian,  though  she  must  see  the  tears. 
"And  an  exceedingly  first-rate  woman,  too.  And 
I'll  always  be  grateful  to  her.  The  question  is,"  — 
he  got  up  and  came  and  stood  over  his  wife,  — 
"I've  been  such  an  ass,  darling.  Can  you  forgive 
me?" 

He  had  found  her  hand  as  he  questioned  her  and 
he  held  it  now  up  to  his  cheek  closing  his  eyes,  how 
differently! 

IV 

MRS.  DALLAS,  after  her  young  friend  had  left  her, 
sat  on  for  quite  a  long  while  on  the  veranda.  The 
concentration  of  her  recent  enterprise  effaced  itself 
from  her  eyes  and  lips.  Her  glance,  steeping  itself 
again  in  indolent  and  melancholy  retrospects,  fell 
into  a  reverie.  Once  or  twice,  putting  up  a  languid 
hand,  she  yawned. 

When  the  whole  garden  lay  in  coolness,  she  went 
in  and  got  her  gardening  apron  and  gloves  and 
basket  of  implements.  It  was  an  ideal  moment  for 
layering  her  carnations.  Tripping  out  again  on  her 
little  high-heeled  shoes,  she  placed  her  kneeling- 
mat  before  a  splendid  plant  and  set  to  work.  She 
scorned  complicated  aids.  A  box  of  long  hairpins 
were  her  chief  allies,  and  a  sharp  knife.  Deftly  she 
selected  a  blue-gray  shoot  and  stripped  the  narrow 
leaves,  sharply  cut  a  transverse  slit  into  the  tender 
stalk,  firmly  bent  and  pinned  the  half-severed  spray 
into  the  heaped  earth  where  it  was  to  make  new 
roots  and  establish  itself  in  a  new  life.  And,  as  she 
did  so,  her  mind  reverting  to  thoughts  of  Rupert 

[206] 


CARNATIONS 

and  of  her  rough  usage  of  him,  a  simile  came  to  her 
that  made  her  smile,  her  hard  and  not  unkindly 
smile.  She  did  not  regret  it,  though  unquestionably 
she  had  had  her  own  moment  of  reluctance  and  of 
loss.  It  had  hurt  him  terribly,  no  doubt,  as,  if  they 
had  feeling,  it  must  now  hurt  her  carnations  to  be 
cut  and  bent  and  pinned.  But  "It  might  be  the 
making  of  him/'  Mrs.  Dallas  thought. 


STAKING  A 


S  a  matter  of  fact  (one  has  often 
to  take  one's  stand  on  fact  when 
thinking  about  Vera),  it's  I  who 
am  the  gardener;  it's  I,  that  is 
to  say,  who  draw  the  plans  and 
compute  the  cost  and  give  the 
orders  and  see  that  the  men 
carry  them  out.  I  often  lend  a  hand  at  carrying 
them  out,  too,  for  I  love  planting  seedlings  and 
staking  plants  and  tweaking  out  weeds  here  and 
there  when  I've  the  chance.  That  wonderful 
blue  border  Vera  had  on  the  south  terrace  last 
summer,  —  it  was  just  going  over  when  the  war 
broke  out,  —  I  put  in  all  the  new  blue  larkspurs 
myself,  three  hundred  of  them,  —  the  larkspurs 
that  Mrs.  Thornton  was  to  remind  me  of,  —  and  I 
designed  and  planted  and  with  my  own  hands 
helped  to  lay  out  the  dream-garden,  Vera's  special 
garden.  It  was  she,  certainly,  who  had  had  the 
idea,  standing  on  the  site  of  the  little,  old,  aban 
doned  sunken  garden  in  its  circle  of  stone  wall  and 
cypresses,  and  saying,  "I  see  a  dream-garden  here, 
Judith;  a  place  where  one  can  come  and  sit  alone 
and  dream  dreams."  She  often  has  charming  ideas, 
Vera,  but  she  knows  nothing  about  gardening.  I 
sound  already  as  if  I  were  crabbing  her,  I  know; 
and  perhaps  I  am.  Certainly  I  never  think  of  her 

[  208  ] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

relation  to  her  garden  without  a  touch  of  irony, 
and  this  story,  which  begins  in  the  dream-garden, 
is  n't  to  her  advantage.  It  was  there  that  I  felt  my 
first  definite  irascibility  in  regard  to  Vera  and  little 
Mrs.  Thornton,  and  felt  the  impulse,  as  far  as  I 
was  able,  to  take  Mrs.  Thornton  under  my  wing. 

It's  a  rather  clipped  and  confined  wing,  and  yet 
I  can  do  pretty  much  as  I  choose  at  Compton 
Dally;  I  don't  quite  know  why,  for  Vera  does  n't 
exactly  like  me.  Still,  she  does  n't  dislike  me,  and  I 
think  she's  a  little  bit  afraid  of  me;  for  I  am  as 
definite  and  determined  as  a  pair  of  garden  shears, 
and  my  silence  is  often  only  the  good  manners  of 
the  dependant,  and  Vera  knows  it. 

I  am  her  cousin,  an  impecunious  cousin,  my 
mother  a  sister  of  her  father's,  old  Lord  Charley- 
ford,  who  died  last  year.  Vera  herself  was  very 
impecunious  until  she  married  Percival  Dixon;  im 
pecunious,  but  always  very  lovely  and  very  clever, 
and  she  was  on  the  crest  of  every  wave,  always,  and 
never  missed  anything,  except  ready  money  and  a 
really  good  offer,  even  before  Percival  Dixon  came 
along  —  he  came  via  South  Africa  —  and  gave  her 
all  the  money  that  even  she  could  spend,  and 
bought  back  Compton  Dally  for  her.  Compton 
Dally  had  been  in  the  family  for  hundreds  of  years, 
and  it  was  our  grandfather,  Vera's  and  mine,  who 
had  ruined  us  all  and  finally  sold  it.  It  was  every 
thing  for  Vera  to  get  it  back,  even  if  she  had  to  take 
Percival  Dixon  with  it;  and  I  confess  that  for 
Compton  Dally  I  could  almost  have  taken  Perci 
val  Dixon  myself;  but  not  quite,  even  for  Compton 
Dally. 

Well,  she  has  always  been  fairly  decent  to  me; 
not  as  decent  as  she  might  have  been,  certainly, 

[  209  ] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

but  more  decent  than  I,  at  all  events,  expected, 
whatever  may  have  been  poor  mother's  hopes  and 
indignations.  I  always  thought  mother  unfair; 
there  was  no  reason  why  Vera  should  go  out  of  her 
way  to  give  me  a  good  time,  and  it  showed  some 
real  consideration  in  her  to  have  suggested,  when 
mother  died  and  while  Jack  was  reading  for  the  bar, 
that,  until  he  and  I  could  set  up  housekeeping  in 
London  together,  I  should  come  and  be  her  com 
panion  and  secretary  and  general  odd-job  woman; 
and  for  people  like  Vera  to  show  any  considera 
tion  is  creditable  to  them.  I  am  five  years  older 
than  Jack,  and  our  plan  has  always  been  to  live 
together.  I  intend,  of  course,  —  though  Jack  at 
present  doesn't,  dear  lamb!  —  that  he  shall 
marry;  but  until  then  I'm  to  live  with  him  and 
take  care  of  him  and  help  him  with  his  work.  All 
this  if  he  ever  comes  back  again.  He  is  fighting  at 
the  front  as  I  write,  so  that  it  remains  to  be  seen 
whether  I  'm  to  go  on  always  with  Vera,.  If  Jack 
does  n't  come  back  I  shan't  find  it  more  difficult 
than  anything  else.  We  have  always  been  all  in  all 
to  each  other,  he  and  I;  but  that  is  quite  another 
story  and  one  that  will  never  be  written.  This  one 
is  neither  about  Jack  nor  me,  but  about  Vera  and 
her  garden  and  little  Mrs.  Thornton  and  her  hus 
band  and  her  clothes. 

Vera  had  thrown  open  Compton  Dally  to 
wounded  Tommies  and  wounded  officers,  and  the 
Thorntons  came  in  that  way.  He'd  only  been  back 
from  the  Boulogne  hospital  for  a  week,  was  badly 
crippled,  and  had  a  very  gallant  record.  Most  of 
Vera's  officers  before  this  had  been  colonials  who 
had  no  homes  to  go  to.  The  Thorntons  were  n't 
colonials,  but  they  had  no  home  and  were  very 

[  210] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

poor,  so  that  the  arrangement  for  them  to  spend 
six  weeks  or  two  months  at  Compton  Dally  while 
Captain  Thornton  got  back  his  strength  —  as  far 
as  he  was  able  to  get  it  back,  poor  man!  —  seemed 
an  admirable  one. 

They  came  on  a  hot  June  afternoon  both  very 
tired,  while  we  were  all  having  tea  on  the  west 
terrace.  The  Tommies  —  there  were  over  a  dozen 
of  them,  with  two  Red  Cross  nurses  to  take  care 
of  them  —  had  their  tea  in  the  billiard-room, 
which  is  made  over  to  them  for  their  games  and 
meals  and  almost  constant  gramophone,  and  the 
accurate  laughter  of  Harry  Lauder  is  wafted  out 
to  us  on  various  music-hall  strains  at  most  hours  of 
the  day.  He  was  laughing  loudly  and  richly  as  the 
Thorntons  arrived.  After  tea  Vera  led  them  about 
the  garden.  Vera's  garden  is  merely  a  part  of  her 
toilette,  and  plays  almost  as  important  a  part  as  her 
clothes  in  her  general  introduction  of  herself;  and 
that  she  intended  to  introduce  herself  gracefully  to 
Captain  Thornton  was  evident;  and  that  I  was  to 
pilot  Mrs.  Thornton,  I  had  known  after  Vera's 
glance  at  her  imitation  Panama  hat,  her  blue  linen 
skirt,  of  an  obsolete  cut  and  a  bad  one  at  that,  and 
her  white  blouse,  shrunken  in  washing.  Vera 
placed  her  swiftly  as  dull  and  dowdy,  and  it  was 
my  part,  always,  to  pilot  the  dowdy  and  the  dull. 

I  don't  mind  that,  however;  even  now,  after 
three  years  of  it,  I  always  enjoy  going  over  Comp 
ton  Dally  and  the  gardens  with  newcomers.  It's 
such  a  beautiful  old  place,  so  grave  and  so  serene, 
its  splendid  Tudor  front  lifted  high  on  stone  ter 
races,  and  its  courts  and  corners  behind  breaking 
out  into  all  sorts  of  unexpected  and  enchanting 
antiquities.  It  symbolizes,  if  you  begin  with  the 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

Saxon  arches  in  the  cellars,  the  whole  history  of 
England,  and  means  so  much  more  than  any  person 
who  has  ever  lived  there,  or  who  ever  will  live  there, 
can  ever  mean.  It's  worth  the  sacrifice  of  genera 
tions  of  younger  sons  and  myriads  of  marriageable 
daughters.  What  could  they  all  do  better  than  to 
keep  it  going?  I  always  recalled  this  when  I  won 
dered  how  Vera  could  have  married  Percival 
Dixon,  and  felt  almost  as  much  satisfaction  as  she 
could  feel  in  the  fact  that  two  robust  little  boys, 
still  at  their  preparatory  school,  stood  reassuringly 
behind  her  and  Percival;  the  elder,  too,  a  thorough 
Compton,  with  hardly  a  trail  of  Dixon  apparent  on 
his  ingenuous  young  countenance.  I  have  the 
whole  history  of  Compton  Dally  at  the  tips  of  my 
fingers,  and  if  people  give  me  an  opening  and  show 
that  they  care  about  it,  I  can  talk  to  them  for  hours 
as  I  take  them  round,  feeling,  for  my  little  part  and 
share  in  it,  that,  even  if  Vera  were  n't  as  decent  as 
she  is,  I  should  put  up  with  a  great  deal  to  stay  in 
it  and  take  care  of  it. 

We  did  n't  go  about  the  house  to-day.  The 
Thorntons  saw  the  big  herbaceous  border  and  the 
rose-garden,  the  rock-garden,  tinkling  with  its 
little  rivulet,  the  moat,  and  the  lime-tree  alley;  and 
then  Vera,  trailing  her  gossamer  draperies  along 
the  flagged  path  between  the  cypresses,  —  for 
Vera,  even  at  this  epoch  of  shortened  petticoats, 
manages  always  to  trail,  —  murmured,  as  I've 
heard  her  murmur,  when  she's  at  Compton  Dally, 
at  least  once  a  week,  "And  this  is  my  dream-gar 
den,  where  I  come  and  sit  alone  and  dream  dreams." 

She  led  Captain  Thornton  down  among  the 
cypress  boughs.  He  had  a  splinted  leg  and  an  un 
accustomed  crutch,  and  found  the  steps  a  difficulty; 

[    212    ] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

but  Vera  put  a  hand  under  his  elbow  and  let  him 
lean  heavily  on  her  shoulder,  and  he  reached  the 
dream-garden  without,  I  hope,  too  many  twinges. 

It  is  really  very  lovely.  I  don't  like  hearing  it 
called  a  dream-garden,  naturally;  but  I  do  feel 
always,  when  I  come  into  it,  that  it  is  like  sinking 
into  the  stillness  and  magic  of  a  happy  dream.  The 
gypsophila  was  n't  out  yet,  but  it  made  a  mist,  like 
drowsiness;  white  peonies,  grey  santolina,  white 
roses  and  silver  sea-thistle,  the  dreamy  spires  of 
white  foxgloves,  low,  purple  pansies,  and  tall 
irises,  white  and  grey  and  purple  —  these,  in  their 
twilight  colours,  were  massed  against  the  grey 
stone  walls,  and  there  were  four  bay-trees  in  stone 
urns  at  the  corners.  The  beautiful  old  stone  seat 
(I  found  it  in  Brompton  Road,  but  it  might  have 
been  made  for  Compton  Dally  three  hundred  years 
ago  in  Italy)  was  heaped  with  grey  and  purple 
cushions.  In  the  centre  rose  the  fluent  shaft  of  the 
fountain,  falling,  with  a  musical  rustle  and  murmur 
into  the  stone  basin  where  pale  goldfish  move 
among  the  water-lilies. 

We  sat  down,  and  Vera  went  on  to  say,  as  al 
ways: 

"The  other  gardens  are  for  friends.  I  plan  them 
for  them.  I  see  them  there.  This  is  for  loneliness, 
for  my  very  self;  and  to  me  it  is  the  heart  of  the 
whole,  as  solitude  should  be  the  heart  of  life." 

Vera,  as  a  matter  of  fact  (you  see,  the  phrase 
recurs  constantly),  is  never  alone.  If  she  is  wan  and 
strange  and  wistful,  it  is  n't  from  dreaming  dreams, 
but  from  not  having  enough  sleep  and  doing  five 
times  too  many  things  and  seeing  five  times  too 
many  people  in  the  day.  Vera,  too,  I  may  say  it 
here,  is  n't  in  the  least  an  ass,  though  she  may,  on 

[213  ] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

occasions  she  finds  suitable,  talk  like  one.  Occa 
sions  are  often  suitable,  so  that,  as  I  once  told  her, 
she's  in  danger  of  making  a  habit  of  it.  She  looked 
at  me,  when  I  told  her  this,  with  the  pausing, 
penetrating,  ironic  gaze  she  is  so  capable  of,  and 
finally,  with  a  slight  grimace,  said,  "I'll  be  careful, 
Judith." 

I  have  moments  of  feeling  fond  of  her  and  this 
was  one  of  them.  She  is  careful;  I've  very  rarely 
heard  her  talk  like  an  ass  when  the  occasion  was  un 
suitable;  but  so  many  people  are  stupid  that  these 
are  rare,  and  I  foresee  that,  as  she  gets  on  and  sinks 
by  degrees  into  the  automatism  that  overtakes  so 
many  artificial  people,  it  may  become  a  habit,  just 
as  the  touch  of  rouge  on  her  pale  lips  is  already 
becoming  more  emphasized. 

Captain  Thornton,  I  saw  at  once,  as  she  did,  — 
for  she  saw  most  things,  —  was  not  stupid;  but  he 
was  very  simple.  There  was  a  certain  bewilderment 
on  his  handsome,  sturdy  face,  wistfulness  rather 
than  delight,  such  as  a  soul  newly  arrived  in  Para 
dise  might  feel,  unable  to  forget  the  passes  of 
death  and  the  companions  left  behind  in  suffering. 
He  was  n't  forgetting;  I  felt  that  as  I  'looked  at 
him.  So  many  of  them  forget.  Vera,  I  am  sure, 
hardly  ever  remembers  what  it  all  really  means  — 
all  these  wounded  heroes.  Perhaps  it  is  natural 
that  she  should  n't;  she  has  no  one  near  in  it. 

Captain  Thornton  gazed  about  him  quietly,  and 
from  the  garden  looked  back  at  the  angel  who  had 
led  him  there.  Of  course  Vera  must  have  looked 
like  an  angel  to  him.  I  have  n't  described  Vera, 
and  she  is  difficult  to  describe.  To  say  that  she  is 
pale  and  dark,  with  attenuated  features  and  dwell 
ing,  melancholy  eyes,  is  only  the  beginning  of  it. 

[214] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

Of  course  she  is  getting  on  now,  —  she  is  nearing 
forty-five,  —  but  she's  still  lovely;  her  smile  makes 
me  think  of  a  pearl  dropped  in  wine,  and  behind 
the  melancholy  of  her  eyes  is  that  well  of  waiting 
irony.  She  looks  as  soft,  as  tenderly  encompassing, 
as  a  summer  night;  but  she  is  really  sharp,  sharp, 
sharp.  Thwart  or  vex  her,  and  out  leaps  the 
stiletto;  or,  rather,  it  would  be  more  exact  to  say, 
out  come  the  claws.  But  women  of  the  Vera  type 
will  always,  to  young  men  like  Captain  Thornton, 
be  angels  pure  and  simple.  I  don't  suppose,  for 
one  thing,  that  he'd  ever  talked  intimately  with 
any  one  quite  like  her.  He  came,  I  was  to  learn, 
from  a  remote  country  rectory  where  the  great 
ladies  of  the  neighbourhood  had  been  unfashiona 
ble,  matter  of  fact,  and  clothed  for  the  most  part 
in  tweed  and  leather,  and  none  of  them  would  have 
been  likely  to  make  much,  before  the  war,  of  a 
young  soldier.  Vera  was  making  much  of  him,  and 
a  fashionable  angel  is  an  angel  doubly  equipped. 
He  would  not  know  what  it  was  that  made  her  so 
strange  in  her  sweetness;  but  fashion  of  that 
achieved  and  recondite  kind  is  like  a  soft  incense 
wafted  around  a  woman.  She  is  first,  everywhere, 
always,  without  an  effort;  and  people  who  are 
first,  if  they  also  look  like  angels,  win  hearts  as 
easily  as  they  run  and  twist  their  fingers  among 
their  ropes  of  pearls,  as  Vera  was  doing  now.  She 
always  wore  her  pearls;  they  fell  together  in  a 
milky  heap  in  her  lap,  and  long  earrings  glim 
mered  in  the  shadows  of  her  hair. 

.  Vera's  way  of  talking,  too,  is  like  a  spell.  Her 
voice  is  rather  like  the  fountain,  so  low,  so  inartic 
ulate,  yet  so  expressive.  She  murmurs  rather  than 
speaks,  with  now  and  then  a  pause  that  is  almost  a 

[215  ] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

soft  gurgle.  Sometimes  it  exasperates  me  to  hear 
her,  but  sometimes  even  cross-grained  I  am  charmed. 

The  voice  purled  and  rippled  and  gurgled  over 
Captain  Thornton  now.  He  sat  on  Vera's  farther 
hand,  and  Mrs.  Thornton  sat  between  Vera  and 
me.  Already,  at  tea-time,  Mrs.  Thornton  had  in 
terested  me.  She  had  remained  silent  without 
seeming  shy.  Superficially,  no  doubt,  she  was 
dowdy,  and  superficially  she  looked  dull,  or,  as  I 
saw  it,  dulled;  and  dull  and  dowdy  is  what  at  tea 
they  all  put  her  down  for.  It's  curious,  how  in  a 
group  of  highly  civilized  people,  a  newcomer,  with 
out  a  word  or  glance  exchanged  between  them,  is 
in  a  moment  assessed  and  placed  and  relegated. 
Everybody  was  going  to  be  very  kind  to  Mrs. 
Thornton,  that  I  saw,  and  everybody  was  going  to 
relegate  her;  only  the  highly  civilized  can  manage 
the  combination. 

Mrs.  Thornton,  from  one  point  of  view,  had  a 
pallid,  podgy  little  face,  with  wide  lips  and  short 
nose  and  a  broad,  infantile  brow  above  eyes  singu 
larly  far  apart.  All  the  same,  and  the  more  I  looked 
at  her  the  more  I  saw  it,  it  was  a  delicious  face; 
squared  here,  stubborn  there,  sweet  by  turns  and 
glances.  And  she  was  of  the  loveliest  colour,  with 
a  skin  silver-white,  and  thick,  shining,  pale-gold 
hair,  and  eyes  of  a  deep,  dense,  meditative  blue. 
All  her  attributes,  however,  were  invisible  to  Vera, 
and  I  was  fully  prepared  for  the  glance  with  which, 
over  Mrs.  Thornton's  imitation  Panama,  she 
presently  said  to  me: 

"Darling,  do  take  Mrs.  Thornton  round  the 
water-garden.  It's  so  lovely  at  this  hour.  Captain 
Thornton  must  wait  for  it  till  to-morrow.  He's  too 
tired  to  go  farther  now." 

1 216] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

Mrs.  Thornton  got  up  at  once,  with  her  air  of 
vague  acquiescence  in  anything  proposed,  and  I 
led  her  up  and  out  and  down  the  lime-tree  alley 
and  through  the  copse,  where  Vera,  in  spring,  has 
her  wild  garden,  to  the  banks  of  the  river,  the  clear, 
wandering  little  stream,  bridged  and  islanded, 
golden  in  the  afternoon  light  under  its  willows  and 
reflecting  irises  and  meadow-sweet. 

"Now  we  can  sit  down,"  I  said,  and  on  a  bench 
under  a  willow  we  did  sit,  Mrs.  Thornton  with  an 
involuntary  sigh  of  weariness.  "I  expect  your 
husband  will  soon  get  all  right  here,"  I  said  pres 
ently.  "It's  such  good  air.  Is  his  leg  badly 
damaged?" 

"Well,  you  see,  he  can  already  get  about  quite 
well  with  it,"  said  Mrs.  Thornton;  "but  I'm  afraid 
he'll  never  be  able  to  do  any  of  the  things  he  most 
cares  for  again  —  riding  and  cricket,  and  his 
soldiering,  of  course.  He  will  have  to  give  up  the 
army.  I  am  afraid  it's  afterwards  one  will  begin  to 
feel  all  the  things  that  one  must  give  up.  Just  now 
all  that  I  can  think  about  is  that  he  has  come  back 
alive.  Have  you  any  one  out  there?"  she  asked. 

I  told  her  about  Jack  and  how  he  had  got  a  com 
mission  at  the  beginning  of  the  war  and  gone  out 
in  January. 

"  It  must  be  even  more  of  a  wrench  to  have  them 
when  they  are  n't  already  in  the  army,"  said 

rs.  Thornton.  "A  soldier's  wife  ought  not  to  feel 
it  so  much  of  a  wrench.  I  'm  afraid  I  did,  though." 

I  saw  already  that  Mrs.  Thornton  had  taken  to 
me.  It  was  natural  that  she  should.  I  had  taken  to 
her  quite  tremendously,  and  she  must  have  felt  it; 
and,  besides,  a  great  many  women  do  feel  confidence 
in  me  at  once.  I,  to  be  sure,  look  like  anything 

[  217] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

but  an  angel,  though  I,  like  Vera,  have  small, 
pale  features  and  dark  hair.  But  mine's  not  a 
melancholy  or  mysterious  face.  My  eyebrows  dip 
together  over  my  nose,  and  my  mouth  is  at  once 
placid  and  irascible.  I  look,  in  my  straight,  austere 
clothes,  —  the  silver  buckles  on  my  shoes  and  the 
fob  of  old  trinkets  at  my  waist  for  all  adornment,  — 
like  a  cross  between  a  young  priest  in  his  soutane 
and  a  Blue-Coat  boy;  and  I  think  it  is  the  boyish 
woman,  curt  and  kind  and  impersonal,  who  gains 
the  confidence  of  others  of  her  sex. 

"I  don't  know  that  it  was  more  of  a  wrench,"  I 
said.  "  I  expect  that  you  and  I  felt  pretty  much  the 
same  sort  of  thing  on  that  Victoria  platform  when 
we  said  good-bye  to  them.  What  do  you  and  your 
husband  intend  doing,  now  that  he  has  to  give  up 
his  profession?" 

"Well,  we  had  thought  of  having  a  chicken- 
farm  somewhere.  We  are  both  so  fond  of  the 
country,  and  I've  a  cousin  who  has  a  chicken-farm, 
and  I've  helped  her  with  it,  and  she  has  made  it 
pay.  Even  if  dive's  leg  stays  so  bad,  I  am  very 
strong.  But  we've  had,  really,  no  time  yet  to  talk 
things  over." 

"You  don't  look  very  strong,"  I  observed,  "but 
that  may  be  because  you  are  over-tired.  You  look 
very  tired.  I  should  say  that  you  got  up  at  six  this 
morning,  and  raced  around  London  shopping  in  the 
heat,  and  packed,  and  had  no  lunch,  and  a  journey 
on  top  of  it  all.  So  no  wonder  you  are  tired." 

"How  clever  of  you!"  Mrs.  Thornton  cried, 
laughing.  "That  is  exactly  what  I  have  been 
doing.  And  I've  been  in  a  Belgian  refugee  hostel 
ever  since  Clive  went,  and  that  is  tiring,  though  it 
keeps  one  going,  too.  Don't  you  find  it  difficult 

[  218  1 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

just  to  go  on  from  day  to  day?"  She  was  leaning 
forward  on  her  knee  now  to  look  up  into  my  face 
while  I  knitted.  "I  mean,  when  one  wakes  in  the 
morning,  for  instance,  to  think  that  one  has  to  get 
up  and  brush  one's  teeth  and  do  one's  hair  and  all 
the  rest  of  it.  It  seems  impossible  when  what  one  is 
feeling  is  that  one  wants  to  be  chloroformed  till  it 
is  all  over.  It  was  then  that  the  hostel  was  so  sus 
taining;  one  had  to  get  up  whether  one  felt  like  it 
or  not." 

"I  know;  yes,"  I  said,  nodding.  "I've  work, 
too,  though  it's  not  so  sustaining  as  a  hostel.  I'm 
my  cousin's  secretary,  and  we  have  all  these 
Tommies  now;  they  take  up  a  good  deal  of  time. 
It  must  be  curious,  having  it  all  over,  all  that 
weight  of  anxiety." 

"It  is,  it  is,"  said  little  Mrs.  Thornton,  eagerly, 
with  her  look  of  gratitude  for  finding  some  one 
with  whom  to  talk  about  it.  "It's  almost  like 
losing  a  limb.  I  feel  crippled,  as  well  as  Clive. 
Isn't  it  absurd?  But  it's  almost  like  loss.  And 
one  is  dazed  with  the  relief  of  it." 

"How  long  have  you  been  married?"  I  asked. 

"Only  a  year  and  a  half,"  she  told  me,  and  that 
Clive's  mother  and  hers  had  been  great  friends, 
and  that  she  had  often  gone  to  stay  with  his  people 
in  the  country,  so  that  she  had  always  known  him. 
Her  mother  had  died  when  she  was  a  child  and  her 
father  only  two  years  ago.  She  had  lived  in  London 
with  her  father,  who  had  been  an  artist.  She  was 
just  twenty.  And  after  she  had  told  me  about  her 
self,  she  asked  me  about  Jack,  and  I  found  my 
self  telling  her  all  about  him  and  about  those  plans 
of  ours  for  living  together  in  London  if  he  ever 
comes  back. 

[  219  ] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

The  party  at  Compton  Dally  was  small,  and 
they  were  all  there  (except  Sir  Francis  who  was 
an  old  family  friend  and  who  was  paying  a  long 
visit),  to  help  Vera  with  her  Tommies.  The  only 
other  officer  besides  Captain  Thornton  was  poor 
Colonel  Appleby,  a  pale,  frightened,  middle-aged 
man  invalided  home  with  nervous  shock.  At 
dinner  that  night  Lady  Dighton,  who  is  the  em 
bodiment  of  lassitude  and  acquiescence,  had  him, 
and  Mrs.  Travers-Cray  had  Sir  Francis,  and 
Vera  had  Captain  Thornton,  so  that  Percival  fell 
to  the  share  of  Mollie  Thornton,  and  I  wondered 
how  she  liked  him.  If  she  was  already  feeling  her 
self  out  of  it,  to  have  Percival  at  dinner  would  n't 
make  her  feel  herself  in;  quite  the  reverse.  Per- 
cival's  appearance  is  always  summed  up  to  me  by 
the  back  of  his  head:  the  wedge  of  fat,  red  neck 
above  his  high  collar,  the  sleek,  glittering  black 
hair,  and  the  rims  of  his  red  ears  curving  forward 
on  each  side.  The  back  of  his  head  seems  really  as 
characteristic  as  the  front,  though  that  is  jovial 
and  not  unkindly.  Percival  looks  sly  over  his  food, 
and  looks  over  his  wine  like  the  sort  of  man  who  is 
going  to  tell  a  story  that  no  one  else  will  find  at  all 
amusing.  He  told  Mollie  several  such  stones  that 
night,  I  inferred,  though  she  was  evidently  neither 
shy  nor  shocked;  it  was  in  the  quality  of  her  smile 
that  I  read  her  kindly  endurance. 

Milly,  Vera's  girl,  just  seventeen  and  just  pro 
moted  to  late  dinner,  sat  on  Mollie's  other  hand 
and  did  not,  as  far  as  I  observed,  address  her  once 
during  the  meal.  But,  then,  Milly  never  makes 
efforts  unless  they  are  plainly  useful.  All  Vera's 
beauty  had  been  spoiled  in  her  by  the  Dixon  ad 
mixture,  and  yet  she  is  a  most  engaging-looking 

[    220] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

little  minx,  with  broad,  bold,  black,  idle  eyes  and  a 
blunted  nose,  auburn  hair  and  a  skin  of  roses  and 
carnations.  Vera  had  seen  to  that.  Poor  Vera  is 
quite  fond  of  the  child,  a  half-vexed,  half-ironic 
constantly  rebuffed  tenderness.  But  Milly  says  to 
me,  "Mother  is  such  a  bore,  you  know,"  and  likes 
me  far  better,  who  make  no  claim  upon  her  and 
who,  she  must  feel,  like  her  very  little.  She  will 
soon  take  flight,  however,  when  a  sufficiently  ad 
vantageous  occasion  presents  itself.  The  war  has 
been  a  sad  blow  to  her  projects,  and  what  I  like  in 
Milly  is  the  fact  that  she  has  never  uttered  a  word 
of  complaint  as  to  the  shattering  of  her  girlish 
gaieties.  However,  to  get  back  to  Mollie  Thorn 
ton,  I  don't  think  she  could  have  enjoyed  her 
companions  at  dinner. 

After  dinner  I  go  and  amuse  the  Tommies  and 
talk  to  the  nurses  until  bedtime,  but,  before  I 
went,  I  observed  that  Vera,  after  her  wont  with 
the  detrimental  belongings  of  a  guest,  had  placed 
Mollie  in  a  corner  with  a  book  and  the  urgent, 
smiling  murmur:  "By  a  friend  of  mine.  Quite, 
quite  beautiful.  I  know  you'll  love  it."  It  is  a 
book  called  "Spiritual  Control,"  with  a  portrait 
of  its  author,  who  is  a  stock-broker,  a  sleek,  stalwart, 
satisfied  person  whom  Vera  characterizes,  why  I 
can't  think,  except  that  she  had  him  once  to  stay 
after  hearing  his  lecture,  as  her  "friend."  A  great 
many  people  find  the  book  inspiring;  Vera,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  does  n't,  and  she  found  Mr.  Cuth- 
bert  Dawson  a  terrible  bore.  It  was  plain  from  her 
giving  poor  Mrs.  Thornton  "Spiritual  Control" 
to  read,  where  she  placed  her. 

When  I  came  back  an  hour  later  she  was  still  in 
her  corner  with  "  Spiritual  Control,"  but  she  wasn't 

r  221  1 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

reading  it.  She  had  drawn  the  curtain  at  the 
window  where  she  sat,  and  was  looking  out  at  the 
splendid,  dramatic  moonlight.  Sir  Francis  and 
Colonel  Appleby  were  reading  the  evening  papers, 
Lady  Dighton  and  Leila  Travers-Cray  talked  to 
gether  while  they  knitted,  Milly  had  disappeared, 
and  at  the  farthest  end  of  the  great  room,  on  its 
farthest  sofa,  Vera,  pale  and  pearly,  was  talking  to 
Captain  Thornton. 

"Well,"  I  said,  "how  is  your  spirit?  Is  it  more 
controlled?" 

Mrs.  Thornton  looked  up  at  me,  and  after  a 
moment  her  smile  of  understanding  merged  into 
one  of  friendly  enjoyment. 

"How  do  you  manage,"  she  said,  "to  be  so 
austere  in  the  daytime  and  so  splendid  at  night? 
You  make  me  think  of  a  Venetian  princess  in  that 
brocade." 

"It  is  nice,  is  n't  it?"  I  said.  "And  made  by 
the  littlest  of  dressmakers.  I'm  clever  at  clothes. 
But  tell  me  how  you  like  Mr.  Cuthbert  Dawson." 

"Well,  he  is  very  cheerful  and  sincere,"  said 
Mrs.  Thornton,  kindly;  "but  I  don't  seem  to  get 
much  out  of  it.  I'm  really  too  tired  and  stupid  to 
read  to-night." 

"And  it's  time  your  husband  was  in  bed,"  I 
said.  "One  of  the  nurses  is  coming  for  him." 

Mrs.  Thornton  looked  down  the  long  room  at 
her  husband. 

"If  only  I'd  had  the  Red  Cross  training,"  she 
said,  "I  could  have  taken  care  of  his  leg  then.  I 
suppose  I  must  n't  ask  to  be  allowed  to.  Is  n't  it 
quite  early?"  she  added.  "He's  enjoying  the  talk 
with  Lady  Vera." 

"It's  half-past  ten,  and  we  are  strict  with  our 

[    222] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

invalids.  Here  is  nurse  now.  I  '11  come  up  with  you 
and  see  that  you  are  comfortable." 

No  one  could  have  said  that  there  was  any 
creature  comfort  lacking  in  Mrs.  Thornton's  re 
ception  at  Compton  Dally.  Captain  Thornton, 
as  the  invalid,  had  a  larger  room,  but  Mrs.  Thorn 
ton's  room,  next  it,  was  quite  as  charming  a  one, 
pink  ^nd  grey,  with  old  French  prints  and  hang 
ings  of  toile  de  Jouy.  She  went  up  to  the  prints 
for  a  moment  of  silent  appreciation  before  turning 
to  me  with  a  sigh,  half  pleasure  and  half  wistful- 
ness. 

"How  lovely  everything  is  here!  Papa  would 
have  been  in  rapture  over  those  Cochins.  I  shall 
enjoy  my  sleep  to-night."  And  then,  —  it  was  her 
only  sign  of  awareness,  —  "I  suppose  I'm  to  be 
allowed  to  go  and  say  good-night  to  Clive  when 
nurse  has  done  with  him." 

My  study  at  Compton  Dally,  where  I  type  and 
write  and  do  accounts,  opens  on  the  west  terrace, 
and  from  my  bureau  I  seemed,  at  most  hours  of 
the  days  that  followed,  to  have  a  view  of  Mollie 
Thornton's  little  figure  wandering,  as  it  were,  on 
the  outskirts,  not  plaintive,  —  there  was  never  a 
touch  of  plaintiveness,  —  but  passive.  With  her 
sewing  or  knitting  or  a  book  she  sat  a  good  deal 
under  the  shade  of  the  cedar  that  stands  at  the 
corner  of  the  terrace,  and  she  spent  a  good  deal  of 
time  drifting  up  and  down  the  vistas  of  the  lawns 
and  park  watching  birds,  a  binocular  in  her  hand. 
She  was  certainly  a  most  comfortable  person  to 
relegate,  since  she  never  looked  melancholy  and 
usually  contrived  to  seem  occupied,  and  Vera, 
when  she  passed  behind  her  on  the  terrace  on  her 

[223 1 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

way  to  the  dream-garden,  Captain  Thornton  be 
side  her,  would  pause  and  put  her  hand  on  her 
shoulder  and  say,  "Happy,  dear?"  in  the  most 
dulcet  tone.  And  when  Mrs.  Thornton,  lifting 
those  meditative  eyes,  answered,  "Yes,  thank 
you,"  Vera,  all  bland  benevolence,  would  say, 
"That's  right,"  and  pass  on.  Leila  Travers-Cray 
and  Lady  Dighton  sometimes  exchanged  a  few 
friendly  remarks  with  her,  and  she  read  the  morn 
ing  papers  to  Colonel  Appleby  when  his  eyes 
hurt  him;  but  she  was  relegated  far,  far  away,  as 
completely  as  any  human  being  could  be  who 
could  in  any  way  count  as  a  guest. 

I  was  very  busy  and  had  not  much  time  to  be 
with  her,  though  all  the  time  I  had  was  hers;  but  I 
knew  accurately  what  she  was  feeling.  I  related  it 
always  with  that  dreadful  Victoria  platform,  with 
those  moments  of  pain  and  yet  of  rapture  which  we 
had  both  known,  when  we  had  felt  ourselves,  in 
our  suffering,  stand  for  England,  lifted  up  in 
accepting  sacrifice  to  the  august  and  beautiful 
spirit  that  claimed  our  dearest.  One  would  ex 
pect,  after  that  transcendent  suffering,  to  find  as 
transcending  a  joy;  but  how  was  joy  possible  to  a 
young  wife  caught  into  what  might  be  to  her  hus 
band  a  fairyland  or  a  paradise,  but  to  her  was  a 
cruel  and  complicated  machine  where  her  only  part 
was  to  turn  round  with  the  other  wheels  and  pre 
tend  to  like  it?  I  knew  that  it  must  not  be  taken 
too  seriously.  It  was  only  to  last  for  six  weeks, 
and  then  she  would  have  her  Clive  back  again; 
yet  while  it  lasted  it  must  make  the  months  of 
suffering  passed  through  seem  happy  by  compari 
son.  There  had  then,  been  nothing  between  them 
but  distance  and  the  fear  of  death;  and  now  every- 

1 224] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

thing  was  between  them  —  everything  Vera  stood 
for;  her  house,  her  friends,  her  smile,  her  pearls, 
her  dream-garden. 

On  morning  after  morning  I  saw  Vera  leading 
him  away  to  it,  with  her  armful  of  books,  and 
Chang,  her  Pekinese,  trotting  at  her  heels.  I  per 
fectly  understood  Vera's  state  of  mind  in  regard  to 
Captain  Thornton.  There  was  no  occasion  for 
commonplace  jealousy.  He  merely  made  her  feel 
cheerful  and  rejuvenated.  Everything  she  had  to 
show  and  tell  him  was  new  to  him.  She  became 
new  to  herself,  poor  old  Vera!  and  gained  from  the 
quiet  regard  of  his  sane  and  simple  eyes  —  hand 
some  eyes  under  straight,  dark  brows  —  a  sense  of 
freshness  and  worth  in  everything.  She  liked  him 
better  than  any  of  the  wounded  heroes  she  had  yet 
had.  Some  of  them  had  been  merely  stupid,  and 
one  or  two  had  been  gloomy,  sardonic  men  — 
men  of  her  own  world,  to  whom  nothing  she  had  to 
say  would  seem  new.  Clive  Thornton  was  neither 
stupid  nor  sardonic,  and  he  was  simple  enough  to 
accept  Vera's  fancy  tricks  —  her  talk  of  dreaming 
dreams  and  solitude  —  as  part  of  an  angel's 
manner,  and  he  was  just  clever  enough  to  be  able  to 
appreciate  anything  she  had  to  say.  I  could  quite 
see  how  endearing  Vera  must  find  his  steady  gaze 
and  his  considering  silences.  Even  with  my  vigor 
ous  espousal  of  his  wife's  side  I  never  felt  angry 
with  him.  His  not  seeing  that  she  was  unhappy 
was  part  of  the  same  innocence  that  made  him 
not  see  that  Vera  was  a  cat.  Mollie,  besides,  took 
quite  as  much  care  to  conceal  her  unhappiness  as 
Vera  to  behave  like  an  angel.  It  never  crossed  his 
mind  that  his  wife  was  relegated;  it  never  crossed 
his  mind  that  they  were  separated.  He  did  not 

[  225 1 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

feel  separated;  they  were  both,  as  far  as  he  knew,  in 
fairyland  together.  And  yet  I  knew  it  might  not 
all  be  so  trivial  and  transient  as  it  seemed.  A  new 
standard  was  being  formed  for  him;  a  new  idea  of 
what  it  was  to  be  an  angel.  It  was  possible  that  all 
unconsciously  he  would  no  longer  think  of  Mollie 
as  one  when  he  left  Compton  Dally;  and  when  I 
took  this  in  I  began  to  gather  up  my  weapons. 

I  found  Mollie  one  afternoon  sitting  on  the 
bench  under  the  willow-tree  where  we  had  had  our 
first  talk.  She  had  her  knitting,  but  her  hands 
were  still,  and  she  was  gazing  before  her  at  the 
water.  If  she  were  not  a  tragic  figure,  it  was  only 
because  there  are  some  things  sadder  than  tragedy. 
She  had  faced  everything,  been  through  every 
thing,  she  had  gone  down  into  the  Hades  where  so 
many  of  us  were  still  living,  and  now  she  found  her 
self  baulked  and  menaced  by  commonplace  day 
light.  Tragedy  is,  in  some  ways,  an  easy  thing 
to  bear. 

"Well,  what  are  you  doing  here  by  yourself ?" 
I  asked  her,  advancing.  There  was  a  look  on  her 
face,  startled  and  steadied,  that  showed  me  what 
she  had  been  thinking  about  in  the  fancied  security 
of  her  solitude.  But  she  managed  at  once  the 
vague  smile  that  concealed  so  much,  and  said  that 
she  had  been,  as  usual,  resting.  "I  seem  to  find 
out  every  day  more  and  more  how  tired  I  was," 
she  added. 

"You  did  n't  care  to  go  with  the  others,  motor 
ing?"  I  took  my  place  beside  her.  "You'd  have 
liked  Marjorams.  It's  a  lovely  old  place.  Some 
people  think  it  beats  Compton  Dally,  though, 
naturally,  I'm  not  one  of  them." 

"I'm  sure  you're  not,"  said  Mollie,  laughing  a 

[  226  1 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

little.  "That  was  one  of  the  things  that  first  struck 
me  about  you  —  how  you  loved  it.  I  felt  that  you 
were  a  fiercely  loyal  person." 

"I  think  I  am  —  narrow  loyalties,  but  fierce 
ones,"  I  said.  "But  you  haven't  answered  my 
question." 

"About  motoring?  I  don't  care  much  about  it, 
you  know.  And  there  really  was  n't  room  enough 
for  me." 

I  knew  there  had  n't  been;  but  I  was  deliberately 
eschewing  tact. 

"Has  Captain  Thornton  gone?"  I  inquired, 
knowing,  also,  that  he  had  n't. 

"No;  Lady  Vera  is  reading  to  him  in  the  flagged 
garden,"  said  Mollie  in  the  voice  that  showed  me 
how  little  she  had  to  learn  about  spiritual  control. 
"Lady  Vera  is  going  to  take  him  out  for  a  run  in 
her  two-seater  before  dinner.  He  enjoys  that  a 
great  deal  more  than  the  big  car." 

"It's  far  pleasanter,  certainly,"  I  agreed.  And 
I  went  on:  "They  are  reading,  you  mean,  in  the 
dream-garden.  You  must  n't  forget  that  it's  a 
dream-garden  —  where  one  goes  to  be  alone." 

She  looked  round  at  me  quickly,  and  after  a 
moment  I  saw  that  she  faintly  coloured.  She  said 
nothing,  leaving  it  to  me  to  follow  up  my  graceless 
gibe.  I  was  quite  ready  to  follow  it  up. 

"As  a  matter  of  fact,"  I  said,  knitting  the  loops 
along  the  side  of  my  heel,  "Vera  hardly  ever  is  alone 
there.  It's  always,  with  Vera,  a  solitude  a  deux. 
She's  not  at  all  the  sort  of  woman  for  real  solitude. 
She  is  the  sort  of  woman  who  likes  to  feel,  or, 
rather,  to  look  lonely  and  not  to  be  alone." 

To  this,  after  a  pause,  Mollie  said: 

"She  is  very  charming;  Clive  finds  her  very 

1 227] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

charming."  And,  forced  to  it,  apparently,  by  my 
crudity,  she  added,  "Are  n't  you  fond  of  her, 
then?" 

"No,  I'm  not;  not  particularly,"  I  said.  "Es 
pecially  not  just  now.  Vera  is  not  at  her  best,  to 
my  mind,  when  she  is  being  angelic  to  young 
married  men." 

Mollie  Thornton  now  blushed  deeply. 

"I  am  perfectly  contented  that  she  should  be 
angelic  to  Clive,"  she  said. 

"You  are  very  loyal,"  I  returned.  "But  you'll 
own  that  he  is  getting  more  out  of  it  than  you  are. 
It's  a  place,  Compton  Dally,  for  wounded  heroes 
rather  than  for  a  wounded  hero's  wife." 

"Do  you  mean,"  she  asked  after  a  moment, 
"that  I  ought  n't  to  have  come?"  She  had  indeed 
owned  to  everything  in  the  bewilderment  of  the 
question.  I  laughed  at  it. 

"Ought  n't  to  have  been  with  your  husband  at  a 
time  like  this!  Even  Vera  could  hardly  ask  that, 
could  she?  And  that's  my  quarrel  with  her;  that 
it's  the  time  of  all  times  that  you  should  be  to 
gether  and  that  she  never  lets  you  see  him,  practn 
cally." 

She  looked  away,  and  after  a  moment  I  saw 
that  her  eyes  had  rilled  with  tears. 

"He  has  n't  an  idea  of  it,"  she  said  at  last. 

"That  fact  does  n't  make  you  happier,  does  it?" 

"He  thinks  I'm  as  happy  as  he  is.  He  thinks 
that  we  are  together  in  it  all,  and  that  she  is  an 
angel  to  me,  too,"  said  Mollie.  "She  always  is  an 
angel  to  me  when  she  sees  me." 

"All  men  are  rather  stupid  when  it  comes  to 
knowing  whether  their  wives  are  happy,"  I  re 
marked.  "I  think  your  Clive  is  a  great  dear;  but 

F  228  1 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

I  like  you  best  because  you  see  things  he  does  n't. 
You,  for  instance,  see  that  Vera  is  n't  an  angel, 
though  she  may  look  like  one." 

"He  has  no  reason  to  think  anything  else,  has 
he?"  said  Mollie,  and  I  saw  that  I  had  brought 
her  to  the  point  to  which  I  had  intended  to  bring 
her.  "I  don't  let  him  guess  that  I'm  not  happy; 
it  would  be  horrid  of  me  if  I  did,  for  it  would  only 
mean  that  he'd  feel  at  once  that  we  must  go  away, 
and  all  this  loveliness  would  be  over  for  him.  A 
stuffy  little  flat  in  Bayswater  is  n't  a  very  alluring 
alternative;  and  that's  where  we'd  have  to  go  — 
to  my  aunt's  —  till  Clive  was  better." 

"How  you'd  love  the  stuffy  flat!  How  glad 
you'd  be  to  be  there  with  him!  And,  to  do  him 
justice,  how  happy  he'd  be  there  with  you!  He 
will  be  in  a  month's  time.  The  only  question  is, 
the  month.  No,  Vera  is  n't  an  angel.  If  she  were 
an  angel,  she'd  have  seen  to  it  that  you  were  happy 
here,  too.  But  when  it  comes  to  being  nice  to  other 
women,  —  really  nice,  I  mean,  —  she  can  be  a 
cat.  And  what  I'd  like  very  much  to  see  now  is 
what  she'd  make  of  it  if  you  could  show  her  that 
you  could  look  like  an  angel,  too.  It's  so  much  a 
matter  of  looks." 

"Make  of  it?  But  I  could  n't  look  like  an  angel." 

"You  could  look  like  a  rival;  that's  another  way 
of  doing  it.  You  could  look  like  another  woman  of 
her  own  sort.  You  could  make  her  see  you.  She 
simply  does  n't  see  you  now.  I  suspect  that  if 
Vera  saw  you  and  saw  that  you  were  charming, 
she'd  show  her  claws.  I'd  like  Captain  Thornton 
to  see  her  showing  her  claws." 

In  silent  astonishment,  her  blue  eyes  fixed  upon 
me,  Mollie  gazed. 

1 229] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

"No,  I  don't  hate  Vera,  if  that's  what  you're 
wondering,"  I  said.  "I  like  you,  that's  all,  and  I 
don't  intend  that  she  shall  go  on  making  you  un 
happy." 

"But  I  don't  want  Clive  made  unhappy," 
Mollie  said.  "I  can't  imagine  what  you  mean; 
but,  whatever  it  is,  I  don't  want  it.  I  could  n't 
bear  all  this  to  be  spoiled  for  him.  I  could  n't 
bear  it  not  to  be  always,  for  him,  a  paradise." 

It  was  my  turn  to  gaze  at  her,  and  I  gazed 
penetratingly. 

"And  what  if  it  all  came  to  mean  that  you 
yourself,  because  of  it,  were  never  to  be  more  to 
him  than  a  second-rate  paradise?  What  if  she 
were  to  spoil  you  for  him?" 

I  brought  out  the  cruel  questions  deliberately, 
and  for  a  moment  Mollie  faced  them  and  me. 

"Why  do  you  say  that?  How  cruel  to  say  that!" 
she  murmured,  and  then  suddenly  she  bowed  her 
head  upon  her  hands.  "It's  been  my  terror.  I'm 
ashamed  of  myself  for  thinking  it.  And  now  — 
you  see  it!" 

I  put  my  arm  around  her  shoulders. 

"I'm  not  cruel.  I  only  want  us  to  see  things  to 
gether.  I  don't  really  think  they'd  ever  come  to 
that;  and,  at  all  events,  he  would  never  know  that 
they  had." 

"But  I  should,"  Mollie  said. 

"Yes,  you  would.  And  it's  horribly  true  that 
real  things  can  be  spoiled  and  blighted  by  false 
things.  I  Ve  often  seen  it  happen.  You  do  see  the 
danger,  and  you  must  take  up  the  burden,  my 
dear,  of  being  cleverer  than  your  husband,  and 
save  him  along  with  yourself.  If  Vera  were  what 
she  looks  and  seems  to  him,  he  might  be  right  in 

[  230] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

feeling  that  he  found  in  her  something  he  could  n't 
find  in  you.  You  must  show  him  that  she  is  n't 
what  she  looks  and  seems  and  you  must  show  him 
that  you  can  be  a  first-rate  paradise,  too." 

"In  a  little  flat  in  Bayswater!  On  a  chicken- 
farm!  No,  it  can't  be  done.  Paradises  of  this  sort 
don't  grow  in  such  places,"  poor  Mollie  moaned. 

"You  can  keep  up  the  real  paradise  in  them  — 
the  one  he  has  already  —  when  you  get  there.  The 
point  is  that  you  must  show  him  now  that  you  can 
look  like  this  one  here.  And  the  way  to  look  it  is  to 
dress  it.  I'm  sure  you've  realized  the  absolutely 
supreme  importance  of  dress  for  women  of  the 
paradise  type  —  the  women  you  see  here,  all  these 
sweet  ministering  angels  to  the  Tommies  and  the 
young  husbands.  I  don't  mean  to  say  that,  with 
the  exception  of  Vera,  they're  not  as  nice  as  you 
are  in  spite  of  being  well  dressed;  but  I  do  mean 
that  if  they  dressed  as  you  do  they'd  not  be  women 
of  the  paradise." 

Mollie's  hands  had  fallen,  and  she  was  gazing 
again  with  eyes  childlike,  astonished,  and  trusting. 

"But,  Judith,  what  do  you  mean?"  she  asked. 
"Dress?  Of  course  you  all  dress  beautifully. 
Have  n't  I  loved  simply  looking  at  you  all,  as  if 
you'd  been  the  most  exquisite  birds?  But  how 
could  I  do  it?  I  have  n't  the  money;  I  never  have 
had.  If  one  has  no  money,  one  must  be  either 
aesthetic  or  dowdy,  and  I  Ve  always  prefered  to  be 
dowdy." 

"Yes,  I  saw  that;  I  liked  you  for  that.  There's 
hope  for  the  dowdy,  but  none  for  the  aesthetic;  the 
one  is  humble,  and  the  other  is  complacent.  Your 
clothes  express  renunciation  simply  —  and  the 
summer  sales.  But  though  it  is  a  question  of 

[  231  ] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

money,  some  women  who  have  masses  of  money 
never  learn  how  to  dress.  They  remain  mere 
dressmakers'  formulas;  and  others,  with  very 
little,  can't  be  passed  by.  They  count  anywhere. 
You've  noticed  my  clothes.  I've  hardly  any 
money,  yet  I'm  perfect.  All  my  clothes  mean  just 
what  I  intend  them  to;  just  as  Vera's  mean  what 
she  intends,  and  Mrs.  Travers-Cray's  and  Lady 
Dighton's,  and  Milly's,  for  Milly  already  is  as 
clever  as  possible  at  knowing  her  thing.  But  you  Ve 
abandoned  the  attempt  to  intend.  You've  sunk 
down,  and  you  let  the  winds  rake  over  you.  You  Ve 
always  made  me  think  of  a  larkspur,  that  blue  and 
silver  kind,  all  pensive  grace  and  delicacy;  but 
you're  a  larkspur  that  has  n't  been  staked.  Your 
sprays  don't  count;  they  tumble  anyhow,  and  no 
one  sees  your  shape  or  colour.  Last  night,  for 
instance  —  that  turquoise-blue  chiffon:  not  tur 
quoise,  and  not  that  sort  of  chiffon." 

"I  know  it.    I  hated  it,"  she  said. 

"Of  course  you  did,  and  so  does  any  one  who 
looks  at  you  in  it." 

"But  I  couldn't  afford  the  better  qualities," 
she  appealed.  "And  in  the  cheaper  ones  I  could  n't 
get  the  blue  I  wanted,  the  soft  Japanese  blue." 

"No,  you  could  n't.  And  you  thought  it 
would  n't  show  if  you  had  it  made  up  on  sateen. 
It  always  does  show.  No,  it  needs  thought  and 
time  and  computing,  too  much  time,  too  much 
thought,  to  say  nothing  of  too  much  money  for 
many  women,  of  course;  for  them  it  would  n't  be 
worth  it.  There  are  other  things  to  do  than  to  live 
in  paradise.  But  for  you  it  is  worth  it;  to  show 
him  that  you  can  look  like  an  angel,  and  to  show 
him  that  Vera  can  look  like  a  cat.  No,  /'//  show 

[232] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

him;  mine  is  the  responsibility.  It's  worth  it,  at 
all  events,  to  me.  I'll  put  in  the  stakes,  and  tie 
you  and  loop  you  and  display  you.  You'll  see.  I 
told  you  I'd  a  clever  little  dressmaker.  That's  an 
essential.  And  we'll  scrape  up  the  money.  You 
shall  be  dressed  for  once  as  you  intend." 

She  was  bewildered,  aghast,  tempted,  and,  on 
the  top  of  everything,  intensely  amused.  Her  face 
was  lighted  as  I'd  never  seen  it  before  with  pure 
mirth,  and  it  looked  like  still,  silver  water  that  be 
comes  suddenly  glimmering,  quivering,  eddying, 
and  sunlit.  She  was  charming  thus  lighted.  It  was 
a  sort  of  illumination  of  which  Vera's  face  is  in 
capable;  her  gaiety  is  always  clouded  with  irony. 

"It  is  all  too  kind,  too  astonishing,  too  funny  for 
words,"  Mollie  said.  "Of  course  I  should  love  to 
be  well  dressed  for  once,  and  I  can't  see  why  I 
should  n't  avail  myself  of  your  little  dressmaker 
now,  —  especially  -now,  since,  as  you  tell  me,  I 
offend  through  my  dowdiness.  And  I  do  really 
need  some  new  clothes.  I  'm  wearing  out  my  trous 
seau  ones,  you  know.  Yes;  was  n't  it  a  horrid  little 
trousseau?  But,  don't  you  see,"  and  the  sunlight 
faded,  "I  can't  be  a  real,  not  a  real  angel,  not  a 
real  paradise.  It's  much  deeper.  It's  a  question  of 
roots.  It's  the  way  they  smile,  the  way  they  walk, 
the  way  they  know  what  they  want  to  say  and 
what  they  don't  want  to  say." 

I  nodded.  "You  know,  too,  and  you'd  say  it,  if 
people  saw  you  and  cared  to  hear  what  you  said." 

"That  would  help,  of  course.  I've  never  felt  so 
stupid  in  my  life  as  here.  But,  oh,  it's  deeper!" 
said  Mollie.  "I  don't  belong  to  it.  How  they  all 
make  me  feel  it!  I'm  an  outsider;  and  why  should 
I  pretend  not  to  be?" 

[  233  ] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

"It  would  n't  be  pretending  anything  to  dress  as 
you'd  like  to  dress.  No  one  who  sees  is  an  outsider 
now  a  days,  if  they  can  contrive  to  make  them 
selves  seen.  That's  the  whole  point.  And  there's 
nothing  you  don't  see.  You  see  far  more  than 
Vera  does.  Don't  bother  about  the  roots.  Take 
care  of  the  flowers,  and  the  roots  will  take  care  of 
themselves;  that's  another  modern  maxim  for  you. 
Your  flowers  are  there,  and  all  that  we  need  think 
of  now  is  how  to  show  them.  Wait.  You'll  see. 
We'll  go  to  London  to-morrow,"  I  said;  "and  this 
very  evening  we'll  have  a  talk  about  your  hair." 

You  may  be  sure  that  I  was  on  the  spot  to  see  a 
week  or  so  later  my  larkspur's  debut  as  an  angel. 
We  were  all  assembled  in  the  drawing-room  before 
dinner,  and  she  was  a  little  late,  as  I,  not  she,  had 
intended  that  she  should  be.  It  was  precisely  the 
moment  for  a  mild  sensation.  The  day  had  been 
hot  and  long.  Everybody,  apart  from  being  anx 
ious,  —  for  everybody  was  anxious,  Sir  Francis 
and  Mrs.  Travers-Cray  with  sons  at  the  front  and 
Lady  Dighton's  husband  in  the  Dardanelles  — 
apart  from  that  ever-present  strain,  everybody 
to-day  was  a  little  jaded,  blank,  and  tired  of  one 
another.  There  reigned,  as  a  symptom,  that  silence 
that  in  the  moments  before  dinner  falls  sometimes 
upon  people  who  know  each  other  too  well  for  sur 
mise  or  ceremony.  They  stood  about  looking  at  the 
evening  newspapers;  they  picked  up  a  book;  they 
sat  side  by  side,  knitting  without  speaking.  Vera, 
sunken  in  a  deep  chair  near  my  sofa,  yawned 
wearily.  No  one,  in  fact,  had  anything  to  look  to 
before  bedtime  except  the  stimulant  of  the  con 
somme  or  a  possible  surprise  in  the  way  of  sweets. 

1 234] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

I  had  known  that  I  could  count  upon  Mollie  not 
to  be  self-conscious  when  she  appeared  in  her  new 
array,  but  I  had  n't  counted  upon  such  complete 
and  pensive  simplicity.  Her  eyes  were  on  me  as 
she  entered,  her  husband  limping  behind  her,  and 
they  seemed  to  ask  me,  with  a  half-wistful  amuse 
ment,  if  she  came  up  to  my  expectations.  She  far 
surpassed  them.  I  never  saw  a  woman  to  whom  it 
made  more  difference.  "It,"  on  this  occasion,  was 
blue  —  the  blue  of  a  night  sky  and  the  blue  of  a 
sky  at  dawn,  the  blue,  too,  of  my  larkspurs,  lap 
ping  at  the  edges  here  and  there,  as  delicately  as 
filaments  of  cloud  crossing  the  sky,  into  white.  It 
made  one  think,  soft,  suave  triumph  that  it  was, 
of  breezes  over  the  sea  at  daybreak  and  of  a  cres 
cent  moon  low  on  a  horizon  and  of  white  shores  and 
blue  Grecian  hills;  at  least  it  made  me  think  of 
these  things,  it  and  Mollie  together;  and  with  it 
went  the  alteration  of  her  hair  —  bands  of  folded 
gold  swathed  round  and  round  her  little  head.  No 
one  but  myself  had  ever  seen  before  that  Mollie 
had  the  poise  and  lightness  of  a  Tanagra  figure  nor 
that  the  shape  of  her  face  was  curious  and  her  eyes 
strange  and  her  skin  like  silver;  but  I  knew,  as  she 
advanced  down  the  long  room,  that  Vera,  sunken  in 
her  chair,  saw  it  all  at  last,  drank  in  every  drop  of 
it,  with  an  astonishment  that,  though  it  expressed 
itself  in  no  gesture,  I  was  able  to  gauge  from  her 
very  stillness,  her  concentration  of  stillness,  as  she 
watched  the  relegated  becoming  visible  at  last. 
It's  not  pleasant  for  anybody  to  have  to  own  that 
they've  been  blind  and  made  a  mistake,  and  Vera 
was  specially  fond  of  discovering  oddity  and  charm 
and  of  claiming  and  displaying  and  discussing  a 
discovery.  And  here  was  oddity  and  charm  which 

[  235  1 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

she  had  not  only  failed  to  discover,  but  had  helped 
to  obscure.  Mollie  was  indeed  visible,  and  every 
eye  was  on  her  as  she  drifted  quietly  forward  in  the 
evening  light  and  sat  down  beside  me.  She  was  mine, 
and  no  one  else's;  that  was  quite  evident,  too. 

That  Captain  Thornton  had  received  something 
of  a  revelation  was  also  evident,  though  it  had  not 
probably  amounted  to  more  than  seeing,  and  say 
ing,  that  Mollie  was  looking  awfully  well;  but  it 
expressed  itself  in  the  fact  that,  instead  of  joining 
Vera,  as  was  his  wont,  he  came  and  sat  down  next 
to  Mollie  on  my  sofa.  We  began  to  talk,  and, 
though  the  watching  pause  was  prolonged  for  yet 
another  moment,  the  others  then  began  to  talk, 
too.  It  was  as  if,  not  quite  knowing  what  had 
happened  to  them,  they  were  all  a  little  cheered 
and  exhilarated;  as  if  they'd  had  their  consomme 
and  as  if  the  sweet  had  been  altogether  a  surprise. 
A  spectacle  of  any  sort  has  this  effect  upon  a  group 
of  jaded  people.  Only  Vera  kept  her  ominous 
silence. 

Dinner  was  announced,  and  we  all  got  up. 
Percival,  with  a  new  alacrity,  approached  Mollie, 
—  he  almost  always  had  Mollie,  —  the  others 
paired  off  as  usual,  and  Vera  rose  to  Captain 
Thornton's  arm.  It  was  then  that  she  said,  smiling 
thoughtfully  upon  Mollie: 

"Are  n't  you  doing  your  hair  in  a  new  way, 
dear?" 

I  saw  from  Mollie's  answering  smile  that  she 
was  still  ingenuous  enough  to  hope  that  she  might 
win  Vera's  approval  with  that  of  the  others,  the 
hope,  too,  that  while  Clive  might  think  of  herself 
as  a  first-rate  angel,  he  should  never  see  Vera  as  a 
cat. 

[236] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

"It  is  new,"  she  said.  "I've  just  learned  how 
to;  Judith  showed  me.  Do  you  like  it?" 

Leaning  on  Captain  Thornton's  arm,  Vera,  with 
gently  lifted  brows,  rather  sadly  shook  her  head. 

"  I  suppose  I  don't  care  about  fashions.  It 's  very 
fashionable,  is  n't  it?  But  I  loved  so  that  great, 
girlish  knot.  People's  way  of  doing  their  hair  is 
part  of  their  personality  to  me.  Judith  cares  so 
much  about  fashion,  I  know.  Do  you  care  about 
fashion,  Captain  Thornton?  Do  you  like  this  fash 
ionable  way?  You  know,  I  can't  help  always 
thinking  that  it  makes  women's  heads  look  like 
cheeses;  in  napkins,  you  know  —  Stiltons." 

It  was  the  first  scratch.  Mollie,  though  with  a 
little  startled  glance,  took  it  with  all  mildness,  mak 
ing  no  comment  as  Percival  led  her  away,  Percival 
remarking  that  it  was,  he  thought,  a  ripping  way 
of  doing  her  hair;  and  I,  as  I  went  out  manless, 
"heard  Captain  Thornton,  behind  me,  saying,  in 
answer  to  Yera's  murmurs : 

"Yes;  I  see;  I  see  what  you  mean.  But,  do  you 
know,  all  the  same  I  think  it's  most  awfully  be 
coming  to  Mollie.  It  brings  out  the  shape  of  her 
face  so." 

"What  a  dear  little  face  it  is!"  said  Vera,  rapidly 
leaving  the  cheese. 

It  all  worked  like  a  stealing  spell.  There  was 
nothing  marked  or  sudden  in  it.  No  one,  I  think, 
except  Vera,  was  aware  that  his  or  her  attitude  to 
little  Mrs.  Thornton  had  changed.  She  had  be 
come  visible,  that  was  all,  and  they  became  aware 
that  she  was  not  only  worth  looking  at,  but  worth 
talking  to.  At  dinner  that  night  old  Sir  Francis 
fixed  his  eye-glass  to  observe  her  more  than  once 
and  after  dinner  he  joined  her  in  the  drawing-room 

[237 1 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

and  talked  with  her  till  bedtime.  It  turned  out 
then  that  he  had  known  her  father  and  actually 
possessed  one  of  his  pictures;  had  been  a  great  ad 
mirer.  Next  morning  he  was  walking  with  her  on 
the  terrace  before  breakfast.  Mollie  in  a  blue  lawn, 
as  sprightly  as  it  was  demure,  her  casque  of  golden 
hair  shining  in  the  sunlight.  Lady  Dighton  asked 
her  that  afternoon  to  come  motoring  with  her  and 
the  Tommies,  and  in  the  evening  I  heard  Mrs. 
Travers-Cray,  while  she  and  Mollie  wound  wool 
together,  telling  her  about  her  two  boys  at  the 
front.  The  only  person  who  did  n't  see  more  of  Mol 
lie  was  Captain  Thornton;  but  that,  I  felt  sure,  was 
because  Vera  was  determined  that  he  should  n't. 

It  was  not  for  a  day  or  two  that  I  was  able  to 
compare  notes  with  Mollie. 

"Well,"  I  said,  joining  her  on  the  terrace  before 
dinner,  "  qa  y  est." 

"It's  extraordinary,"  said  Mollie.  "Everything 
is  different.  I  myself  am  different.  I  feel,  for  one 
thing,  as  if  I  'd  become  clever  to  match  my  clothes. 
It  would  be  almost  humiliating  to  have  the  mere 
clothes  make  so  much  difference  and  every  one 
change  so  to  me  unless  I  could  really  feel  that  I'd 
changed,  too." 

"You're  staked.   I  told  you  how  it  would  be." 

"And  I  owe  it  all  to  you.  It's  a  wonderfully  sus 
taining  feeling  to  be  staked;  secure,  peaceful.  Such 
a  funny  change,  Judith,  is  little  Milly!  Have  you 
noticed?  She  came  up  to  me  when  I  was  walking 
this  afternoon  and  linked  her  arm  in  mine,  and  in 
ten  minutes  was  confiding  in  me  all  about  her  per 
plexed  love-affairs,  as  if  we'd  been  old  friends." 

"Yes,  she  would.  She  loves  to  tell  people  about 
her  love-affairs." 

1 238] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

"But  I  could  n't  have  imagined  that  she  was 
really  so  ingenuous;  for,  in  a  sense,  she  is  ingen 
uous." 

"Exceedingly  ingenuous  when  she  is  n't  ex 
ceedingly  sophisticated;  I  think  one  often  sees  the 
mixture.  The  only  thing  you  must  be  prepared  for 
with  the  Milly  type  is  that  in  a  week's  time  she 
may  forget  that  she  ever  confided  in  you  and,  al 
most,  that  she  ever  knew  you.  Her  ingenuousness 
is  a  form  of  presumptuousness." 

"Yes,  I  think  I  saw  that.  I'm  beginning  to  see 
so  many  things  —  far  more  things  than  I  '11  ever 
have  use  for  on  a  chicken-farm,  Judith."  And 
Mollie  laughed  a  little. 

"And  what  does  your  husband  say?"  I  asked. 

"Well,  I've  not  seen  much  of  him,  you  know. 
But  I'm  sure  he  likes  it  awfully,  the  way  I  look." 

"  OnlyVera  won't  let  him  get  at  you  to  tell  you  so." 

"Oh,  he  sees  enough  of  me  to  tell  me  so,"  said 
Mollie,  smiling:  "only  it  takes  him  time  to  come 
to  the  point  of  saying  things,  and  it's  true  that  we 
have  n't  much  time." 

"And  she  has  n't  given  you  any  more  scratches 
before  him?" 

"Not  before  him."  Mollie  flushed  a  little.  "It 
was  a  scratch,  was  n't  it?  I  don't  think  he  saw 
that  it  was." 

"He  will  see  in  time.  And  it's  worth  it,  is  n't  it, 
since  it's  to  make  him  see?" 

"Yes,  I  can  bear  it.  She's  rather  rude  to  me 
now  when  he  is  n't  there,  you  know;  but  it's  really 
less  blighting  to  have  some  one  see  you  enough  to 
be  rude  to  you  than  to  see  you  so  little  that  they 
are  affectionate.  Yet  I  hope  she  won't  be  too  rude." 

"She  can  hardly  bear  it,"  I  said. 

[239] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

It  was  the  next  morning  that  Vera  showed  me 
how  little  she  was  able  to  bear  it.  She  had  kept  me 
singularly  busy,  as  if  afraid  that  I  might  wave  a 
magic  wand  even  more  transformingly,  and  she 
came  into  the  study  where  I  was  writing  invita 
tions  for  a  garden-fete  in  aid  of  the  Red  Cross 
fund,  and  after  giving  me  very  dulcetly  a  long  list 
of  instructions,  she  went  to  the  window  and  looked 
out  for  some  silent  moments  at  Mollie  sauntering 
up  and  down  with  Sir  Francis  under  the  blue 
bubble  of  her  parasol. 

"I  suppose  you  dressed  her  when  you  took  her 
up  to  town  that  day,"  she  then  remarked. 

I  had  wondered  how  long  Vera  could  keep  under 
cover  and  I  was  pleased  to  see  her  emerge. 

"Well,  hardly  that,"  I  said,  marking  off  with  my 
pen  the  names  of  the  people  on  my  list  who  were 
away  and  not  to  be  counted  on  for  help  with  the 
bazaar.  "She  badly  needed  some  clothes  and 
could  n't  afford  expensive  places;  so  I  took  her  to 
my  little  woman.  She  was  able  to  carry  out 
Mollie's  ideas  perfectly.  She  has  charming  ideas, 
has  n't  she?  She  knows  so  exactly  what  suits  her." 

"  Carry  out  her  ideas  ?  She  has  n't  an  idea  in  her 
head.  Carry  out  yours,  you  mean,  you  funny 
creature.  I  can't  conceive  why  you  took  the  pains 
to  dress  up  the  deadly  little  dowd."  Vera  drummed 
with  her  fingers  on  the  window-pane.  Mrs.  Travers- 
Cray  had  joined  Mollie  and  Sir  Francis,  and  they 
sat  down  in  a  shady  corner  of  the  terrace.  Mrs. 
Travers-Cray,  sweet,  impassive,  honey-coloured 
woman,  was  one  of  the  few  people  for  whose  opin 
ions  and  tastes  Vera  had  a  real  regard. 

"Oh,  you  're  mistaken  there,  Vera,  just  as  you've 
been  mistaken  about  her  looks,"  I  said,  all  dis- 

[  240  ] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

passionate  limpidity.  "She  has  heaps  of  ideas,  I 
can  assure  you,  and  I  saw  it  from  the  beginning; 
just  as  I  saw  that  she  was  enchanting  looking." 

"Enchanting!  Help!  Help!  That  little  skim- 
milk  face,  with  those  great  calfs  eyes!  Who  is  the 
poor  dear  martyr  thing  who  carries  her  eyes  on  a 
plate?  St.  Lucia,  is  n't  it?  She  makes  me  think  of 
that  —  as  much  expression.  You  may  have  suc 
ceeded  in  making  her  less  of  a  dowd,  but  you'll 
never  succeed  in  making  her  less  of  a  bore." 

"Well,  Mrs.  Travers-Cray  does  n't  find  her  a 
bore,"  I  remarked,  casting  a  glance  of  quiet,  satis 
fied  possessorship  at  the  group  outside. 

"Oh,  Leila  always  was  an  angel,"  said  Vera, 
"and  your  little  protegee  has  made  a  very  de 
termined  set  at  her." 

"Sir  Francis  is  an  angel,  too,  then.  He  delights 
in  her;  that's  evident."  It  was  perhaps  rather  in 
discreet  of  me  to  goad  Vera  like  this,  but  I  could 
not  resist  taking  it  out  of  her  and  rubbing  it  into 
her,  and  I  knew  that  Sir  Francis  would  vex  her 
almost  as  much  as  Mrs.  Travers-Cray.  "And  look 
at  Milly,"  I  added.  "You  can't  say  that  Milly  is 
an  angel.  The  fact  is  that  Mrs.  Thornton  is  a  very 
charming  young  woman,  and  that  if  you  don't  see 
it  you  are  the  only  person  who  does  n't." 

"Another  person  who  does  n't  see  it  is  her  hus 
band,"  said  Vera.  She  was  determined  not  to  show 
that  she  was  angry,  but  I  could  see  how  angry  she 
was.  "Sir  Francis,  of  course,  old  goose,  thinks  any 
one  charming  if  they  are  young  and  dress  well  and 
look  at  him  with  appealing  eyes.  It  is  her  husband 
I'm  really  sorry  for.  It's  evident  that  he  never 
spoke  to  a  civilized  woman  in  his  life  till  he  came 
here.  He  does  n't  show  much  signs  of  finding  his 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

wife  interesting,  does  he?  Poor  fellow!  It's  pitiful 
the  way  men  fall  into  these  early  marriages  with 
the  first  curate's  daughter  they  find  round  the 
corner.  And  now  that  she's  pushing  herself  for 
ward  like  this,  he  is  done  for."  Vera,  I  saw,  was 
very  angry  to  be  goaded  so  far. 

"  Surely  she  is  the  more  interesting  of  the  two," 
I  blandly  urged.  "  Neither  of  them  has  a  spark  of 
ambition  if  it  comes  to  pushing;  they'll  be  quite 
happy  on  their  chicken-farm.  But  if  it  were  a 
question  of  getting  on  and  getting  in  with  the 
right  people,  it  would,  I  imagine,  be  she  rather  than 
he  who  would  count.  This  last  day  or  two  has 
made  that  evident  to  my  mind.  In  her  soft,  strange 
way  little  Mollie  is  unique,  whereas  he  is  only  an 
honest  young  soldier,  and  there  are  thousands  more 
just  like  him,  thank  goodness!" 

Vera  at  this  turned  her  head  and  looked  at  me 
for  a  moment.  After  all,  even  if  I  was  n't  angry,  I, 
too,  had  given  myself  away.  And  it  evidently 
pleased  her  to  recognize  this  —  to  recognize  that 
she  was  n't  being  worsted  merely  by  Mollie's  newly 
revealed  charm,  but  by  my  diplomacy  as  well.  And 
it  is  rather  a  good  mark  to  Vera,  I  think,  that 
I  don't  believe  it  ever  crossed  her  mind  for  a  mo 
ment  that  she  had  the  simplest  method  of  speedy 
vengeance  in  her  hands  —  had  simpJy  to  send  me 
packing.  Of  course  we  should  both  have  known 
that  to  use  such  a  method  would  have  been  to 
reveal  one's  self  as  crude  and  vulgar;  yet  a  cattish 
woman  who  is  very  angry  may  easily  become  both. 
Vera  did  n't.  There  are  things  I  always  like  about 
her. 

She  took  up  now  one  of  my  lists,  and  while  she 
scanned  it  said,  smiling  with  cousinly  good-humour: 

[  242  ] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

"Ah,  but  you  can  hardly  expect  me  to  look  upon 
you  as  a  judge  of  that,  Judith  darling  —  how  much 
a  man  counts,  I  mean,  and  how  much  he  does  n't. 
You  are  so  essentially  a  woman's  woman,  are  n't 
you?  I  suppose  it's  just  because  you  are  so  crisp 
and  clever  and  unromantic  that  men  don't  feel 
drawn  to  you,  foolish  creatures!  So  that  you  never 
get  a  chance,  do  you,  of  finding  out  anything  about 
them  except  their  way  of  brushing  their  hair  and 
the  colour  of  their  ties.  You  're  a  first-rate  woman's 
woman,  I  grant  you,  and  you're  very  clever  and 
you've  succeeded  in  foisting  your  little  friend  on 
silly  Sir  Francis  and  on  Leila  Travers-Cray,  and 
it's  all  rather  dear  and  funny  of  you,  and  I  Ve  quite 
loved  watching  it  all  and  seeing  you  at  work;  but 
you  won't  succeed  in  foisting  Mrs.  Thornton  on 
her  husband,  and  he'll  hardly  give  you  an  oppor 
tunity  of  finding  out  whether  he's  anything  more 
than  an  honest  young  soldier.  I  have  found  him," 
—  and  Vera  now  spoke  with  a  simple  candour,  — 
"quite,  quite  a  dear;  with  a  great  deal  in  him  — 
sensitiveness,  tact,  flavour.  So  much  could  have 
been  made  of  him!  I,  in  my  little  way,  could  have 
taken  him  up  and  started  him.  But  what  can  one 
do  for  a  man  who  has  a  wife  who  does  n't  know  how 
to  dress  without  help  and  who  will  push  herself 
forward?  No;  I'm  afraid  Mrs.  Mollie,  after  she's 
left  your  hands,  Judith  dear,  will  tumble  quite, 
quite  flat  again.  Would  you  mind,  darling,  getting 
all  the  invitations  off  to-day?  We  mustn't  be 
slipshod  about  it.  And  don't  forget  to  write  to  the 
merry-go-round  man,  and  to  Mark  Hammond  to 
see  if  he'll  sing."  So,  having  delivered  what  she 
hoped  might  be  a  somewhat  stinging  shaft  at  my 
complacency,  Vera  trailed  away. 

[243 1 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

If  I  had  n't  so  goaded  her  I  don't  believe,  really, 
that  she'd  have  taken  the  trouble  that  she  did  take 
to  prove  herself  right  and  me  wrong.  There  had 
been,  before  this,  little  conscious  malice  or  in 
tended  unkindness.  But  now  the  claws  were  out. 
During  the  next  day  or  two  it  at  once  justified  and 
infuriated  me  to  watch  the  manifold  little  slights 
and  snubs  of  which  poor  Mollie  was  the  victim, 
the  dexterity  with  which,  while  seeming  all  sweet 
ness,  Vera  essayed  to  belittle  and  discompose  her, 
to  display  her  as  ignorant  or  awkward  or  second- 
rate.  Only  a  woman  can  be  aware  of  what  another 
woman  is  accomplishing  on  these  lines,  and  though 
Captain  Thornton  once  or  twice  showed  a  puzzled 
brow,  her  skill  equalled  her  malice,  and  he  never 
really  saw.  I  was  prepared  for  it  when  Mollie 
came  to  my  study  one  morning  and  shut  the  door 
and  said: 

"I'm  afraid  I  can't  stand  it  any  longer,  Judith." 

"  It  has  been  pretty  bad,"  I  said.  "  She 's  been  so 
infernally  clever,  too." 

"Our  time  is  really  nearly  up,"  said  Mollie,  "and 
I'm  trying  to  think  of  some  excuse  for  getting 
Clive  to  feel  we'd  better  go  before  it  comes.  Only 
now  she's  telling  him  that  I  am  jealous  of  her." 

Pen  in  hand,  I  leaned  back  and  looked  up  at  my 
poor  little  accomplice.  This,  I  recognized,  was 
indeed  Vera's  trump-card,  but  I  certainly  had  n't 
foreseen  that  she  would  use  it. 

"Has  he  told  you  so?"   I  asked. 

"Oh,  no,  he  would  n't.  He  could  n't,  could  he? 
But  I  know  it.  Men  are  very  transparent,  are  n't 
they,  Judith?  He  is  always  urging  me  to  see  more 
of  her,  and  telling  me  that  she  is  so  kind,  so  clever, 
such  a  dear,  and  that  I  'd  really  think  so,  too,  if  I  'd 

[  244  ] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

try  to  see  more  of  her.  And  when  I  say  that  I  'm 
sure  she  is,  and  that  I  hope  I  shall  see  more  of  her, 
he  thinks  —  I  can  see  it  —  that  I  'm  only  playing  up, 
and  between  us,  her  and  me,  he  is  rather  wretched 
and  uncomfortable.  What  shall  I  do,  Judith? 
You  saw  the  way  at  tea  yesterday,  when  she  was 
talking  about  pictures,  she  was  really  sneering  at 
father's,  and  when  I  tried  to  answer,  —  because  I 
felt  I  had  to  answer  about  that,  —  making  me  seem 
so  rude  and  sullen.  Clive  knows  nothing  about 
pictures;  so  he  did  n't  understand.  And  it's  all  the 
time  like  that.  I  have  to  pretend  not  to  see  and  be 
bland  and  silent;  or,  if  I  try  to  answer,  she  turns 
everything  against  me." 

"Be  patient.  Give  her  a  little  more  time,"  I 
said.  "She'll  run  to  earth  if  you  give  her  a  little 
more  time." 

"But  it  is  so  horrid,  between  Clive  and  me, 
Judith:  if  I  say  what  I  think  to  him,  he  will  only 
see  it  as  jealousy,  so  even  with  him  I  have  to 
pretend,  and  it  makes  me  feel  as  if  I  were  growing 
to  be  like  her,  and  I  can't  bear  it." 

I  meditated  while  poor  Mollie  dried  her  eyes, 
to  which  the  irrepressible  tears  had  risen.  "Ask 
him  if  he  can't  arrange  for  you  to  see  more  of  her," 
I  said  presently. 

She  looked  at  me  with  a  general  trust,  yet  a  par 
ticular  scepticism. 

"But  she  will  make  that  seem  as  if  I  were  trying 
to  force  myself  on  them;  because  she's  always  with 
him,  is  n't  she?" 

"Only  now  because  she  keeps  him,  not  because 
he  wants  to  stay.  I  'm  quite  sure  that  he  wants  to 
be  more  with  you.  I  think  you  can  manage  it, 
Mollie.  Just  say,  when  he  next  urges : '  Oh,  but  I  'd 

[  245  ] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

love  to,  Clive.  Only  you  must  tell  me  when.  Per 
haps  sometime  you'd  take  me  to  the  dream-garden 
when  you  think  she'll  be  there  and  that  she'd  care 
to  have  me,  and  then,  when  you  get  us  started,  you 
could  leave  us.  You  could  go  and  take  Judith  for 
a  stroll.'  Something  of  that  sort." 

She  eyed  me  sadly  and  doubtfully. 

"I'll  try  whatever  you  tell  me  to  try,  but  I  feel 
afraid  of  her.  I  feel  as  if  she  cared,  really  cared,  to 
do  me  harm." 

"She's  been  proved  wrong,"  I  said,  "and  I've 
rather  rubbed  it  in;  but  at  the  worst,  Mollie,  she 
can  never  harm  you  now  as  there  was  clanger  of  her 
doing.  It's  better,  far  better,  you'll  own,  for  your 
husband  to  think  you're  jealous  and  a  naughty 
angel  than  for  him  to  think  you're  a  second-rate 
one."  With  this  aphorism,  for  the  time  being,  she 
had  to  be  contented.  I  myself  felt  sure  that  the 
hour  of  reckoning  was  to  come. 

It  was  next  afternoon,  after  lunch,  Vera  being 
engaged  in  the  drawing-room  with  visitors,  that  I 
met  Captain  Thornton  on  the  lawn  with  his  wife. 
Mollie  was  very  large-eyed  and  rather  pale,  and  I 
inferred  from  her  demeanour  that  she  had  taken  a 
step  or  made  a  move  of  some  kind. 

"Do  come  with  us,  Miss  Elliot,"  said  Captain 
Thornton.  "I'm  just  taking  Mollie  along  to  the 
dream-garden.  She  wants  to  have  a  little  talk,  all 
to  herself,  with  Lady  Vera,  and  Lady  Vera  told  me 
to  wait  for  her  there  till  these  people  were  gone;  so 
it's  just  the  thing.  And  you  and  I  can  leave  them 
together,  do  you  see?  People  never  get  really  to 
know  each  other  unless  they  are  alone  together,  do 
they?" 

"No,  they  don't,"  I  replied.  "Though  sometimes 

[  246] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

they  never  get  to  know  each  other  when  they  are 
alone  together,"  I  could  n't  resist  adding;  but  as  I 
saw  a  slight  bewilderment  on  his  honest  face  I  in 
dulged  in  no  further  subtleties,  and  made  haste  to 
add,  "Does  Vera  know  that  you  were  going  to 
arrange  a  meeting?" 

"Oh,  not  a  bit  of  it.  That's  just  the  point," 
said  the  guileless  young  man.  "  I  want  her  to  think 
that  it's  all  Mollie's  doing,  you  know;  because  she's 
got  it  into  her  head  that  Mollie  does  n't  really  care 
about  her.  Funny  idea,  is  n't  it?  As  if  Mollie  could 
be  like  that  to  any  one  who's  been  as  kind  to  us  as 
Lady  Vera  has!  But  I'm  sure  that  if  they  have  a 
few  quiet  talks  it  will  all  come  right.  Mollie  is  so 
undemonstrative;  I  told  her  that.  It  needs  time  for 
her  to  get  used  to  anybody." 

Mollie,  her  arm  within  her  husband's,  cast  across 
his  unconscious  breast  a  grave,  deep  glance  upon 
me  as  he  thus  quoted  his  defence  of  her.  What  was 
she  to  do  with  Vera,  the  glance  perhaps  asked  me, 
too,  now  that  she  was  to  have  her?  What  account 
of  the  interview  would  Vera  serve  up  to  Clive? 
Was  not  her  last  state  to  be  worse  than  her  first? 
I  tried,  in  my  answering  glance,  to  reassure  and 
sustain,  yet  I  myself  felt  uncertainty  about  this 
fulfilment  of  my  counsel. 

We  reached  the  dream-garden.  Vera  and  Cap 
tain  Thornton  had  been  there  for  most  of  the  morn 
ing,  and  books  and  papers  were  piled  on  the  seat 
where  the  grey  and  purple  cushions  denoted  atti 
tudes  of  confident  tete-a-tete. 

Captain  Thornton  and  I  talked  about  the  war, 
and  I  saw,  with  a  mild,  reminiscent  irony,  remem 
bering  Vera's  sting,  that  he  was  perfectly  prepared 
to  give  me  every  opportunity  for  judging  him.  I 

[  247] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

felt,  indeed,  though  Vera  had  so  absorbed  him,  that 
he  had  never  cared  to  talk  about  the  war  with  her. 
She  and  the  other  angels  were  there  to  help  one  to 
forget,  but  with  me  he  was  glad  to  remember.  It 
was  I  who  heard  Vera's  swift  footfall  approaching. 
Captain  Thornton,  stooping  to  mark  out  with 
books  and  pencils  the  plan  of  a  battle,  had,  I  think, 
almost  forgotten  the  coming  interview,  and  until 
Vera  appeared  among  the  cypresses,  flushed  above 
her  pearls,  he  remained  unaware.  She  stood  there 
at  the  top  of  the  steps  for  a  moment,  looking  down 
at  us,  at  Captain  Thornton  and  me,  our  heads  so 
close  together,  and  at  Mollie  in  her  blue  and  with 
her  unrevealing  little  face,  and  I  saw  from  her  ex 
pression,  as  she  took  us  all  in,  that  she  had  not  been 
succeeding  so  well  with  Captain  Thornton  as 
Mollie  and  even  I  had  feared.  It  was  a  smoulder-* 
ing  irritation  against  him  that  flared  up  with  her 
anger  against  Mollie  and  me. 

"Oh!"  she  said,  a  dreadfully  significant  mono 
syllable  on  Vera's  competent  lips.  It  expressed  sur 
prise  and  weariness  and  the  slight  embarrassment 
of  the  civilized  confronted  with  the  barbarian. 
"Oh!"  she  repeated,  and  she  descended  the  steps, 
Chang  trotting  after  her  with  his  countenance  of 
quizzical  superciliousness.  "I'm  so  very,  very 
sorry."  She  did  not  look  at  any  of  us  now;  her 
voice  was  exceedingly  inarticulate  and  exceedingly 
sweet.  "I'm  afraid  there's  been  a  mistake.  It's 
the  other  gardens  that  are  for  my  friends.  I'm 
charmed  always  to  see  them  there.  And  there  are 
so  many  other  gardens,  are  n't  there?  But  this  is 
my  own  dream-garden,  my  very  own;  for  solitude, 
where  I  come  to  be  alone.  One  must  be  alone  some 
times.  I  get  very  tired." 

1 248] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

We  had,  of  course,  all  risen,  Clive  staring,  while, 
still  with  those  weary,  averted  eyes,  Vera  softly  beat 
the  desecrated  cushions  and  shook  them  into  place. 

"It's  my  fault,"  Clive  stammered.  "I  mean  — 
I  did  n't  understand.  I  thought  you  and  Mollie 
could  have  a  talk  here.  She  wanted  to  get  to  know 
you  better,  and  I  suggested  this." 

Vera  had  sunk  down  in  her  corner,  patting  her 
silken  knee,  so  that  Chang  sprang  up  upon  it  and 
settled  down  among  the  pearls.  "I'm  very,  very 
sorry,"  she  gurgled,  with  oh,  such  vagueness! 
"It's  my  one  corner.  My  one  place  to  be  alone.  I 
don't  see  people  here  unless  I've  asked  them  to 
come."  She  took  up  a  review  and  opened  it,  and 
her  eyes  scanned  its  pages. 

We  were  dismissed,  —  "thrown  out,"  as  the 
Americans  say,  —  and  we  retreated  up  the  steps, 
Mollie  helping  Clive,  and  down  the  flagged  path  and 
out  into  the  lime-tree  alley. 

It  was  a  display  so  complete  that  it  left  me,  in 
deed,  a  little  abashed  by  the  success  of  my  ma 
noeuvres,  while  at  the  same  time  I  felt  that  I  must 
n't  let  Captain  Thornton  discern  the  irrepressible 
smile  that  quivered  at  the  corners  of  my  mouth. 
When  we  were  out  on  the  lawn  he  turned  his 
startled  eyes  on  me. 

"Really,  you  know,  I'd  no  idea,  Miss  Elliot  — 
what?"  He  appealed  to  me. 

"That  Vera  could  lose  her  temper?"   I  asked. 

Clive  continued  to  stare. 

"It  comes  to  that,  does  n't  it?  What  else  can  it 
mean?"  He  looked  now  at  his  wife.  "To  speak 
like  that  to  you,  Mollie!  And  when  she's  been  say 
ing  she  wanted  so  awfully  to  make  real  friends  with 
you." 

[  249  ] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

Mollie,  I  saw,  was  dismayed.  The  triumph  had 
been  too  complete.  She  could  not  keep  up  with  it. 

"I  am  sure  that  Lady  Vera  is  very  badly  over 
wrought  about  something,"  she  said.  "  She  wanted 
particularly  to  be  alone  and  she  found  us  there,  and 
it  put  her  on  edge."  Actually  she  was  trying  to 
patch  up  his  fallen  angel  for  him. 

"But  she  told  me  to  wait  there  for  her.  —  Sent 
me  off  to  wait  for  her  when  those  people  came," 
said  Clive.  "It  seems  to  me  that  it  was  you  she 
minded  finding.  And  yet  she's  been  going  on 
about  your  never  coming  to  talk  to  her.  She 's  been 
going  on  about  it  like  anything."  He  caught  him 
self  up,  blushing,  and  I  saw  that  Vera  was  all 
revealed  to  him.  I  hardly  needed  to  pluck  another 
pinion  from  her,  though  I  did  n't  resist  the  temp 
tation  to  do  so,  saying: 

"You  see,  Vera  is  rather  jealous.  She  can't  bear 
sharing  things  —  her  friends  of  her  dream-garden. 
She  liked  to  have  you  there,  but  she  did  n't  like  to 
have  Mollie  there.  Did  she  tell  you  she  wanted  to 
make  friends  with  Mollie?  She's  never  taken  any 
pains  to  show  it,  has  she?" 

"Oh,  please,   Judith!"  Mollie  implored. 

"But  he  sees  it  all  now,  Mollie,  so  why  should  n't 
I  say  it?"  I  inquired.  "Her  point  has  been,  Cap 
tain  Thornton,  to  keep  you  in  and  to  keep  Mollie 
out,  and  she  very  nearly  succeeded  in  doing  it." 

"Please,  Judith!  It's  not  only  that.  She's  been 
such  a  real  friend  to  you,  Clive!  I'm  sure  she  is 
overwrought  about  something,  and  it  will  be  all 
right  when  you  next  meet  her."  But  Mollie 
pleaded  in  vain. 

"I'm  hanged  if  it  will  be  all  right!"  said  Captain 
Thornton. 

[250] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

Vera  made  no  attempt  to  reinstate  herself.  It 
was  part  of  her  strength  never  to  try  to  recover 
what  was  lost.  She  kept  up  appearances,  it  is  true, 
but  that  was  for  her  own  sake  rather  than  in  any 
hope,  or  even  wish,  to  regain  his  good  opinion. 
When  we  all  met  at  tea,  she  came  trailing  in,  with 
Chang  under  her  arm,  and  as  she  sank  into  her 
place,  diffusing  the  suavest  unconsciousness,  she 
said  to  Mrs.  Travers-Cray: 

"Charlie  Carlton's  been  killed,  have  you  heard? 
This  war  is  something  more  than  I  can  bear." 

Charlie  Carlton,  as  I  knew,  was  a  cousin  of  the 
recent  callers  and  a  most  remote  friend  of  Vera's; 
but  it  was  the  best  that  she  could  do  for  the  occa 
sion,  and  all  that  she  was  inclined  to  do,  though  a 
melancholy  smile,  as  impersonal  as  it  was  impartial, 
was  turned  more  than  once  on  Captain  Thornton 
and  Mollie  as  she  inquired  whether  they  liked 
sugar  in  their  tea  or  had  enough  cream.  She  had 
made  their  tea  for  six  weeks  now,  and  after  the 
first  week  she  had  never  forgotten  that  they  both 
liked  sugar  and  both  disliked  cream.  But  she  thus 
washed  her  hands  of  intimacy  while  keeping  up  the 
graces  of  hostess-ship.  They  might  have  arrived 
that  afternoon. 

Mollie  and  her  husband  rose  beautifully  to  the 
situation,  for  their  last  two  days  at  Compton  Dally; 
that  is,  Mollie  rose,  for  the  husband  at  such  times 
has  only  to  follow  and  be  silent.  I  don't  think  that 
she  could  have  shown  a  grace  and  a  distance  as 
achieved  as  Vera's  had  it  not  been  for  those  charm 
ing  clothes  of  hers.  You  must  have  something  to 
rise  from  if  you  are  to  float  serenely  above  people's 
heads;  otherwise  you  merely  stand  on  tiptoe,  very 
uncomfortably.  Mollie  and  Vera  might  have  been 

[  251  ] 


STAKING  A  LARKSPUR 

two  silken  balloons,  passing  and  repassing  suavely 
in  the  dulcet  summer  air.  And  on  the  last  day 
Vera's  sense  of  dramatic  fitness  prompted  her,  evi 
dently,  to  the  most  imperturbable  volte-face:  she 
showed  to  Mollie  a  marked  tenderness.  To  Captain 
Thornton  she  was  kind,  perfectly  kind,  but  that 
she  found  him  rather  dull  was  evident.  It  might 
have  been  Mollie  with  whom  she  had  spent  all 
those  hours  in  the  dream-garden. 

"Must  you  really  go,  dear?"  she  asked. 

Mollie  said  that  she  was  afraid  they  must.  She 
had  heard  from  her  aunt,  who  was  waiting  to  take 
them  in,  and,  owing  to  all  Vera's  kindness,  Clive 
was  now  quite  strong  again.  Vera  did  not  insist. 

"I've  so  loved  getting  to  know  you!"  she  said, 
holding  Mollie's  hand  at  the  door  of  the  motor  on 
the  morning  of  their  departure.  "It's  been  such  a 
pleasure.  You  must  often,  often  come  to  Compton 
Dally  again.  Goo^-bye,  dear!" 

But  Mollie  knew,  and  Vera  knew  that  she  knew, 
that  never  again  would  they  be  asked  to  Compton 
Dally.  Meanwhile,  if  the  war  is  n't  over  and  Jack 
has  n't  come  back,  I  'm  to  go  and  stay  with  them 
next  spring  on  the  chicken-farm. 


EVENING  PT(IMT(OSES 


)T  had  been  a  hot  day  and  there 
seemed  to  be  thunder  in  the  air, 
but  she  was  afraid  there  would 
be  no  rain  that  night.  The 
abandoned  garden  needed  it 
sadly;  though,  as  she  reflected, 
rain  would  encourage  weeds 
rather  than  the  few  remaining 
flowers.  Poppies  had  sown  themselves  everywhere, 
degenerates  of  the  Shirleys  which,  three  years  ago, 
had  spread  their  silken  cups  in  the  large  bed  at  the 
foot  of  the  lawn.  Their  withered  stalks  cracked 
beneath  her  steps  in  the  paths  and  glimmered 
under  the  unpruned  branches  of  the  cordon  apple 
trees.  There  were  thistles,  too,  sorrel,  and  tall 
nettles,  a  matted  carpet  of  bindweed  and  groundsel 
in  the  little  kitchen-garden,  once  so  neat,  and,  of 
course,  as  poor  Charlie  had  predicted,  the  Michael 
mas  daisies  had  eaten  up  nearly  everything  in  the 
herbaceous  border.  That  was  one  of  the  last  ques 
tions  he  had  written  to  her:  "How  are  my  pink 
phloxes?  Have  the  Michaelmas  daisies  smothered 
them?"  They  had.  It  was  the  season  at  which  the 
phloxes  should  be  in  fullest  flower,  but  not  one  was 
to  be  seen;  the  dense,  fine  foliage  of  the  daisies  had 
advanced  in  a  wall  of  green  nearly  to  the  border's 
edge. 

It  was  still  oppressively  warm.   A  toad  hopped 

[253] 


E  FEN  ING  PRIMROSES 

indolently  away  and  paused  at  the  box  edging, 
lying  up  against  it,  his  front  feet  extended,  as  if  so 
wearied  by  the  heat  that  he  took  his  chances  of 
discovery.  She  stopped  to  look  at  the  clumsy 
creature,  in  which  so  little  of  nature's  accurate 
grace  was  expressed;  and  as  she  stood  there,  a 
sudden  rustle  in  the  box  betrayed  another  in 
habitant  —  this  time  a  baby  hedgehog  which,  too 
young  for  fear,  moved  busily  about  among  the  flat 
dandelion  plants  that  resetted  the  path,  and  even, 
encountering  the  tips  of  her  shoes,  stopped  to 
examine  them  carefully  before  moving  on  again. 
The  baby  hedgehog  would  have  amused  Charlie. 
He  had  always  been  delightful  about  animals;  he 
and  the  boys  had  always  had  that  great  interest  in 
common. 

Yes,  the  bird-boxes  were  still  there.  She  could 
see  one  in  the  big  apple  tree  and  one  fixed  to  the 
porch  of  the  house,  under  the  rose.  How  well  she 
remembered  the  frantic  delight  that  hailed  the 
hatching  of  the  first  brood  of  tits.  And  the  day  when 
Charlie  had  deemed  it  prudent  to  withdraw  the 
door  for  a  peep  at  the  beautifully  fitted  mosaic  of 
bright  little  heads  and  bodies  within,  lifting  up 
Giles  in  his  holland  pinafore  for  a  long,  blissful 
gaze.  Six  years  ago  that  must  have  been. 

The  light  was  altering  now,  and  when  she  turned 
at  the  end  of  the  path,  a  great  moon  had  risen 
across  the  lane  and  seemed  to  hang  in  the  branches 
of  the  walnut  tree  that  grew  in  the  field  beyond. 
A  great,  shining,  heavy  moon,  and  mournful,  it 
seemed  to  her;  her  desolate  thoughts,  she  was 
aware,  lending  their  colour  to  everything.  Heavy, 
mournful,  desolate;  that  was  the  rhythm  of  her  own 
steps  passing  along  in  the  twilight,  pursued  by  the 

[  254] 


E  7 EN  ING  PRIMROSES 

unformulated  consciousness  that  lay  behind  all 
these  pictures  of  the  past;  pausing  at  last,  as  if  to 
let  the  dogging  sorrow  overtake  her,  as  she  came 
to  where,  near  the  summer-house,  against  the  wall, 
the  evening  primroses  grew. 

It  was  years  since  Charlie  had  first  planted  them 
there,  and  she  had  said  to  herself  at  the  time  that 
they  would  never  be  rid  of  them,  tenacious,  recur 
rent  things,  sowing  themselves  patiently,  and 
coming  up  loyally  even  when  there  was  no  one  to 
wish  them  well.  She  felt  touched  by  their  presence; 
for  though  she  had  always  found  them  untidy  and 
uninteresting,  she  saw,  really  now  for  the  first  time, 
that  they  could  be  beautiful.  Homely,  loyal  flow 
ers;  yet  —  was  it  the  invading  sense  of  sorrow  col 
ouring  them,  too?  —  a  little  uncanny,  showing  at 
this  neutral  hour  of  mingled  dusk  and  moonlight 
their  pale,  evident  gold;  becoming  conscious,  as  it 
were,  becoming  personal  at  the  time  when  other 
flowers  became  invisible.  Not  that  it  was  a  sinister 
uncanniness;  not  that  of  ghosts;  of  fairies,  rather; 
the  very  strangeness,  sadness,  sweetness  of  the 
moon,  to  which,  from  them,  she  lifted  her  eyes. 
And  they  reminded  her  of  something,  but  what, 
she  could  not  say.  Not  of  Charlie.  There  had  never 
been  anything  strange  or  sad  about  Charlie,  ex 
cept  the  fact,  pursuing  her  now  in  his  deserted 
garden,  that  he  was  dead  and  would  never  see  it 
again. 

It  was  a  year  to-day  since  he  had  been  killed,  and 
she  had  come  down  to  the  country  with  the  sense  of 
commemoration.  She  wanted,  alone  in  the  little 
place  so  full  of  thoughts  of  him,  to  find  him,  to  re 
call  him;  and  she  had  been  doing  that  at  every 
turn.  Yet  the  evening  primroses  shining  there 

[255  ] 


E  FEN  ING  PRIMROSES 

brought  a  pang  deeper  than  any  vision  of  him. 
They,  though  so  homely,  seemed  to  personify 
loneliness;  they  seemed  to  be  missing  something; 
and  although  she  was  desolate  because  Charlie 
was  dead,  because  he  would  never  again  delight  in 
his  garden,  it  was,  in  a  sense,  for  him  rather  than  for 
herself  that  she  sorrowed,  and,  in  a  sense,  she  did 
not  miss  him  at  all. 

She  stood  still  in  the  path,  her  hands  clasped  be 
hind  her,  her  head  bent,  a  personification  of  widow 
hood  in  her  thin  black  draperies,  her  intent,  me 
morial  poise.  And  she  could  have  said  of  herself  with 
truth  that,  during  all  this  year,  she  had  known 
only  a  widow's  sad  preoccupations.  There  had  been 
the  settling  of  business  matters;  lawyers  and  bank 
ers  to  interview;  planning  for  the  boys,  with  school 
masters  to  visit;  and  the  tending  of  bereaved  rela 
tions  —  Charlie's  dear  old  parents  clung  to  her. 
But  now,  on  the  day  of  his  death,  it  was  as  if  for 
the  first  time  she  had  had  leisure,  at  last,  to  realize 
that,  with  it  all,  she  had  never  had  the  widow's 
heart.  She  had  grieved  over  him;  she  had  longed 
to  do  all  for  him  that  could  be  done  —  there  was 
nothing  new  in  that;  but  it  was  far  worse  than  not 
being  heartbroken:  it  was  the  sorry  fact  that  she 
did  not  even  miss  him.  He  had  left,  as  it  were,  no 
emptiness  behind  him. 

She  had  lifted  her  head  and  looked  round  the 
garden,  trying,  in  the  physical  fact  of  absence,  to 
summon  the  spiritual  void.  How  he  had  planned, 
dug,  planted  it;  pruned  his  fruit  trees;  placed  his 
anemones  in  leaf-mould,  his  bulbs  on  sand.  She 
saw  his  kindly,  handsome  figure  everywhere;  his 
brown  cheek,  good  grey  eye,  and  close-cropped, 
tawny  hair.  A  manly,  simple  creature;  the  salt  of 

[256] 


EFENING  PRIMROSES 

the  earth,  as  honest  as  the  day  —  oh,  she  saw  it  all; 
she  had  said  it  to  herself  a  hundred  times;  and  there 
had,  indeed,  been  nothing  one  could  say  against 
Charlie.  But  then,  as  a  wife,  there  had  been  nothing 
to  say  against  her,  either;  he  had  been  perfectly 
happy  with  her  —  the  happiest  creature,  even  in  the 
manner  of  his  death.  He  had  been  killed  instan 
taneously,  while  walking,  on  a  sunny  day,  beside 
his  men  along  a  road  in  France.  Every  letter  she 
had  had  from  his  brother  officers  over  there  spoke 
of  his  gaiety  and  good  spirits.  The  war  itself  had, 
on  the  whole,  meant  happiness  to  him,  for  all  his 
gravity  over  certain  of  its  tragedies.  But  he  had 
been  almost  as  grave  over  mischances  with  his  Boy 
Scouts,  and  it  had  all  remained  for  him  an  immense, 
magnificent  form  of  boy-scouting. 

Dear,  good  Charlie!  Yet  —  was  it  possible  that 
something  of  the  old  long-conquered  exasperation 
could  still,  at  this  hour,  thrust  itself  into  her  mem 
ories?  He  had  not  been  quite  boyish  enough  to 
justify  his  lightness  and  make  it  loveable.  That  had 
been  the  final  fundamental  trouble  in  their  mis 
taken  marriage;  she  had  not  been  able  to  mother 
him.  He  had  not  been  appealing,  beguiling,  en 
dearing,  like  a  child.  Not  like  a  child;  not  boyish, 
fatherly,  rather;  even  playfully  didactic,  and  as 
suming  always  that  theirs  was  a  completely  recip 
rocal  marital  intimacy.  It  had  not  been  his  fault, 
of  course.  She  had  been  too  clever  ever  to  let  him 
guess  how  stupid  she  found  him.  She  felt  the 
possessive  arm  laid  about  her  shoulders  for  an 
evening  stroll;  saw  the  wag  of  his  premonitory 
finger  as  he  raised  himself  from  a  border  to  call  out 
a  jocose  reprimand;  heard  the  chaff  with  which, 
before  friends,  he  counted  her  mistaken  opinions. 

[257] 


E7ENING  PRIMROSES 

And  it  had  been  when  they  were  alone,  especially 
at  dinner,  —  Charlie  across  the  table  from  her  in 
his  faultless  black  and  white,  —  that  the  pressure 
of  their  distance  had  been  most  difficult  to  protect 
him  from.  He  talked  then,  and  she  had  to  answer 
adequately.  He  was  fond  of  talk,  and,  while  the 
most  uncritical  of  Conservatives,  was  full  of  solu 
tions  for  old  ills.  He  took  Trade-Unionists,  Home- 
Rulers,  and  Dissenters  playfully  and  held  them 
up  to  kindly  ridicule.  "You  can  laugh  most  people 
out  of  their  nonsense,"  was  one  of  Charlie's  maxims ; 
and  if  they  did  n't  respond  to  the  treatment,  —  he 
had  tried  it  unsuccessfully  on  the  village  cobbler 
who  preached  in  the  tin  chapel  on  Sunday,  —  he 
suspected  them  of  being  rather  wicked. 

In  the  first  year  of  their  marriage  she  had  paid  him 
the  compliment  of  disagreement,  or,  at  least,  dis 
crimination.  She  had,  until  her  marriage,  thought 
of  herself  as  a  Conservative;  to  be  counted  one  by 
Charlie  disturbed  her  sense  of  rectitude.  But  Char 
lie  opposed,  became  puzzled,  and  finally  aggrieved. 
He  bothered  and  bothered  and  argued  and  argued, 
with  the  air  of  trying  to  bring  an  erring  child  to 
reason.  "Now  look  at  it  in  this  light,"  he  would 
say.  Or,  "Try  to  see  the  thing  squarely,  Rosa 
mund";  and  would  turn  upon  her  irrelevant  bat 
teries  from  the  Spectator.  She  had  at  last  the  sen 
sation  of  flying,  battered  and  breathless,  from  his 
platitudes,  and  found,  soon,  her  only  refuge  in 
duplicity.  After  that,  through  all  the  years  of  their 
married  life,  Charlie,  she  knew,  thought  of  their 
evening  hours  alone  together  as  exceedingly  pleas 
ant  and  successful.  He  was  n't  one  of  your  fellows 
who  doze  over  the  Field  with  a  cigar  after  dinner. 
He  had  a  clever  wife  and  he  appreciated  her  and 

1 258] 


EVENING  PRIMROSES 

was  proud  —  in  spite  of  feminine  aberrations 
affectionately  recognized  and  checked  —  of  what 
he  called  her  "intellects."  He  called  his  father  and 
mother  his  "respected  progenitors  "  and  his  stomach 
was  never  other  than  "  Little  Mary."  And  while  he 
talked  and  expounded  and  made  his  unexacting 
jests,  Rosamund  knew  that  her  silences  had  no 
provocation,  her  smile  no  irony. 

So  it  had  gone  on  —  so  it  might  have  gone  on 
for  the  normal  span  of  life.  The  only  insecurity 
that  had  threatened  her  careful  edifice  was  the 
question  of  the  boys.  The  boys  were  like  herself,  or, 
rather,  like  her  adored  and  brilliant  father  — 
proud,  sensitive,  ardent  little  creatures,  tender 
hearted  and  frightfully  intelligent.  Physically,  too, 
they  were  of  a  different  race  from  Charlie,  with 
thick  brown  locks,  passionate  yet  gentle  eyes,  and 
full,  small,  closely  closing  mouths.  As  boys, 
Charlie  had  fairly  well  understood  them,  —  he  got 
on  well  with  the  average  boy,  —  as  persons,  never; 
and  though  as  boys,  at  least  as  little  boys,  they  got 
on  beautifully  with  him,  they  had,  as  persons, 
almost  at  once  understood  him,  even  when  they 
were  too  young  to  evade  or  hide  from  him.  If  they 
had  not  been  so  young,  they  would,  already,  then, 
have  hurt  him  often. 

And  for  her  the  boys  at  once  complicated  every 
thing.  It  had  been  easy,  in  one  way,  to  yield  in 
non-essentials,  though  she  was  woman  enough  to 
cry  her  eyes  out  when  Charlie  had  taken  Philip 
and  Giles,  at  the  earliest  age,  to  have  their  dear 
Jeanne-d'Arc  heads  close-cropped  in  pursuit  of  the 
ideal  of  manliness;  easy,  comparatively,  to  steel 
her  heart  when  timid  little  Philip,  blanched  with 
terror,  was  made  to  ride  at  six.  Charlie  had  been 

[259] 


E  7 EN  ING  PRIMROSES 

right  about  that,  —  how  glad  she  had  been  to  own 
it!  —  for  Philip  had,  in  a  week's  time,  forgotten 
his  fears.  But  she  and  Charlie  had  come  near 
quarrelling  over  Giles's  rag-doll  Bessie.  Giles  was 
only  three  and  adored  Bessie,  and  Charlie  had 
tossed  her  in  the  air,  mocked  her,  and  held  her  up 
by  the  toe  while  Giles  sobbed  convulsively. 

"Do  you  really  want  our  boys  to  be  milksops, 
Rosamund?"  he  had  asked,  as,  refusing  to  argue, 
she  took  the  doll  from  him,  placed  her  in  Giles's  arms, 
and  kept  them  both  on  her  lap,  pressed  within  her 
arms,  her  head  bent  down  over  them  so  that  she  need 
not  look  at  her  husband.  He  had  gone  away  van 
quished,  and  Giles  had  kept  his  Bessie,  until,  in  the 
course  of  nature,  she  had  dropped  away  from  him. 

Worse  than  this  came  one  day  when  Charlie  had 
found  Philip  in  a  corner  writing  poetry.  He  had 
not  been  altogether  pleased  by  the  children's  lit 
erary  tastes.  To  grind  dutifully  at  Latin  and 
Greek  was  one  thing,  and  he  was  fond  of  a  tag  from 
Tennyson.  But  he  had  never  cared  to  read  Keats 
and  Shelley  when  he  was  a  kid.  He  took  the  copy 
book  out  of  Philip's  reluctant  hands  and,  turning 
from  page  to  page,  read  out,  in  mock-dramatic 
tones,  the  derivative,  boyish  efforts,  which  yet,  to 
her  ear,  had  every  now  and  then  their  innocent,  bird- 
like  note  of  reality. 

"And  now  this  —  'To  a  Skylark,'"  said  Charlie, 
laying  a  restraining,  affectionate  hand  on  Philip's 
shoulder,  wishing  him  to  rise  superior  to  vanity 
and  join  in  the  fun,  once  it  was  pointed  out  to  him. 

"  *  Glad  creature  from  the  dew  upspringing 
And  through  the  sky  your  path  upwinging!' 

Up,  up,  pretty  creature!" 

r  260  i 


EFENING  PRIMROSES 

Philip,  twisting  round  under  his  father's  arm, 
burst  into  tears  of  rage,  tore  the  book  from  his  hand 
and  struck  him. 

It  had  been  a  terrible  moment,  and  Rosamund, 
reduced  as  she  almost  was  to  Philip's  condition, 
had  never  more  admired  her  husband,  who,  turn 
ing  only  rather  pale,  had  walked  away,  saying, 
"I  think  you'll  be  sorry  for  that  when  you  think 
it  over,  old  fellow."  That  he  had  been  astonished, 
cut  to  the  quick,  she  had  seen,  feeling  it  all  for 
him  at  the  moment  of  her  deepest  feeling  for 
Philip. 

"I'm  not  sorry!  I'm  not  sorry!"  Philip  had 
sobbed,  rushing  to  her  arms  and  burying  his  head 
on  her  breast.  "I'm  not  sorry!  He's  stupid! 
stupid!  stupid!" 

"Hush,  hush,"  she  had  said  —  what  a  horrid 
moment  it  had  been!  "That  is  wrong  and  con 
ceited  of  you,  Philip.  You  must  learn  to  take  a  little 
chaffing.  You  know  how  your  father  loves  you." 

"It's  not  conceited!  It's  not  conceited  to  care 
about  what  one  tries  to  do.  You  know  it's  not. 
You'' re  not  stupid!"  the  boy  had  sobbed. 

Alas,  it  had  been  only  four  years  ago;  only  a  year 
before  the  war!  Even  then,  at  nine,  Philip  had 
been  old  enough,  when  he  recovered  from  his 
weeping,  to  know  that  he  had  hurt  her  most,  had 
made  things  difficult  for  her;  and  he  had  been  sorry 
about  his  father,  too,  going  to  him  bravely  with  a 
tremulous,  "Please  forgive  me,  father."  "That's 
all  right,  old  boy,"  Charlie  had  said.  It  was  all 
right,  too,  in  a  sense.  It  left  not  a  trace  in  the 
sweetness  of  Charlie's  nature.  It  was  Philip  who 
had  been  shaken,  frightened  to  the  very  core,  by 
what  his  own  outburst  had  revealed  to  himself  and 

[261  ] 


EFENING  PRIMROSES 

to  her.  The  boy  would  always  have  felt  affection 
for  his  father;  but  he,  too,  would  soon  have  pro 
tected  him;  he,  too,  would  hardly  miss  him. 

The  moon  had  now  risen  far  up  out  of  the  walnut 
branches,  and  flooded  the  garden  with  sorrowful 
brightness.  Poor,  poor  Charlie!  was  that  all  it 
came  to,  then,  for  him?  this  deserted  garden  and  a 
wife  and  children  who  hardly  missed  him?  Why, 
was  it  not  the  very  heart  of  his  tragedy  for  her  to  see 
that  they  would  be  happier  without  him?  "And  he 
was  a  dear,"  she  said  to  herself,  remembering  with 
an  almost  passionate  determination  kind,  trustful 
looks  and  the  happy  love  of  fifteen  years  ago. 

She  had  been  standing  still  all  this  while,  near 
the  evening  primroses;  but  now,  with  the  great 
sigh  that  lifted  her  breast,  she  moved  forward 
again,  and  a  bird,  disturbed  in  its  rest,  flew  out 
from  the  thick  tangle  of  honeysuckle  at  the  en 
trance  to  the  summer-house,  startling  her.  As  she 
stopped,  her  eyes  drawn  to  the  spot,  she  saw,  sud 
denly,  that  a  pale  figure  was  sitting  in  the  summer- 
house,  closely  shrunken  to  one  side;  hoping  in  its 
stillness,  —  that  was  apparent,  —  to  remain  un 
discovered.  Ever  since  she  had  entered  the  garden 
it  must  have  been  sitting  there;  and  ever  since  she 
had  entered  the  garden  it  must  have  been  watching 
her.  But  why?  How  strange! 

Dispelling  a  momentary  qualm,  she  stooped  her 
head  under  the  honeysuckle  and  entered;  and  then, 
clearly  visible,  with  her  pale  hair  and  face,  —  as 
pale,  as  evident  as  an  evening's  primrose,  —  the 
girl  sitting  there,  wide-eyed,  revealed,  with  her 
identity,  that  haunting  analogy  of  a  little  while 
ago.  Of  course,  it  came  in  a  flash  now,  that  was 
what  they  reminded  her  of.  Long  ago  she  had 


EFENING  PRIMROSES 

thought  —  conceding  them  their  most  lovable  as 
sociation  —  that  Pamela  Braithwaite  looked  like 
an  evening  primrose. 

"My  dear  Pamela,"  she  said,  almost  as  gently 
as  she  would  have  said  it  to  a  somnambulist;  for, 
like  the  flowers,  again,  she  was  sad,  even  uncanny; 
although  Pamela's  uncanniness  too,  —  sweet, 
homely  creature,  —  could  never  be  sinister.  She 
put  a  hand  upon  her  arm,  for  the  girl  had  started 
to  her  feet. 

"Oh  —  do  forgive  me,  Mrs.  Hayward!"  Pamela 
gasped.  Sad?  It  was  more  than  that.  She  was 
broken,  spent  with  weeping.  "I  did  n't  know  you 
were  coming.  I  sit  here  sometimes  in  the  evenings. 
I  thought  you  would  n't  mind." 

"My  dear  child,  why  should  I  mind?  I'm 
thankful  to  you  for  coming  to  the  sad  little  place. 
It's  much  less  lonely  to  think  about,  for  you  have 
always  been  so  much  of  our  life  here." 

This,  she  knew,  was  an  exaggeration;  but  she 
must  be  more  than  kind  to  such  grief  as  this:  she 
must  find  some  comfort,  if  that  were  possible. 

And  to  feel  herself  accepted,  welcomed,  did  give 
comfort;  for,  sinking  again  on  the  seat,  bending  her 
face  on  her  hands,  Pamela  sobbed,  "Oh,  how  kind 
you  are!" 

"Poor  child,  poor,  poor  child!"  said  Rosamund. 
She  was  only  five  years  older,  but  she  felt  as  a 
mother  might  feel  towards  the  stricken  girl.  She 
put  an  arm  around  her,  murmuring,  "Can  you  tell 
me  what  it  is?  Don't  cry  so,  dear  Pamela." 

Pamela  Braithwaite  had  been  a  girl  of  eighteen 
when  they  had  come,  in  the  first  year  of  their  mar 
riage,  to  Crossfields.  The  Braithwaites  lived  a  mile 
away,  near  the  river,  a  large,  affectionate,  des- 

[263  ] 


EVENING  PRIMROSES 

ultory  family,  in  a  large,  dilapidated  house.  Al 
ready  Pamela  mothered  the  younger  brood,  and 
mothered  the  widowed  father  as  well  —  a  retired 
tea-planter,  who  had  brought  from  Ceylon  some 
undefined  but  convenient  complaint  that  enabled 
him  to  pass  the  rest  of  his  days  wrapped  in  a  num 
ber  of  coats,  eating  very  heartily,  and,  as  he  ex 
pressed  it,  "sitting  about."  A  peaceful,  idle  man, 
legs  outstretched  in  sun  or  firelight,  hat-brim 
turned  down  over  his  eyes  (he  had  a  curious  way, 
even  in  the  house,  of  almost  always  wearing  his 
hat),  pipe  between  his  teeth;  good-looking,  too, 
tall  and  fair,  like  his  daughters,  and  with  a  touch 
in  his  appearance,  though  not  in  his  character,  of 
amicable  distinction. 

Pamela,  except  for  a  brother  already  married 
and  in  Ceylon,  was  the  eldest,  with  a  long  gap  be 
tween  her  and  the  group  of  younger  brothers,  of 
whom  Rosamund  thought  mainly  as  a  reservoir  of 
Boy  Scouts  until  they  had  had  to  be  thought  of  as 
a  reservoir  of  volunteers.  There  were  three  or  four 
younger  sisters,  too,  some  of  whom  had  married 
and  some  of  whom  had  gone  forth  into  the  world  — 
always  with  an  extreme  light-heartedness  and  con 
fidence  —  as  companions  or  secretaries.  These 
again  were  hardly  individualized  in  Rosamund's 
recollection,  except  for  the  fact  that,  since  Pamela 
was  always  making  blouses  or  trimming  hats  for 
them,  she  had  become  aware  that  it  was  Phyllis 
who  wore  pink  and  Marjory  blue. 

But  whoever  went,  Pamela  always  stayed;  and 
even  when  the  war  broke  upon  the  world,  with 
Frank,  the  Braithwaite  baby,  just  old  enough  to 
enlist,  and  Phyllis  and  Marjory  at  once  enrolling 
themselves  as  V.A.D.'s,  Pamela  remained  rooted. 

[264] 


E  7 EN  ING  PRIMROSES 

Who,  indeed,  had  she  gone,  would  have  taken  care 
of  Mr.  Braithwaite,  and  of  the  brothers  and  sisters 
home  on  leave,  and  of  the  garden  earnestly  dedi 
cated  to  potatoes,  or  the  small  family  of  Ceylon 
nephews  and  nieces  deposited  continually  in  her 
charge  by  their  parents  ? 

Poor  little  Pamela!  She  had  had  a  burdened  life; 
the  assiduities  of  maternity  and  none  of  its  initial 
romance.  With  her  large,  clear  eyes,  very  far 
apart,  she  had  always  a  wistful  look;  but  it  was 
that  of  a  child  watching  a  game  and  waiting  for  its 
turn  to  come  in,  and  no  creature  could  have  given 
less  the  impression  of  weariness  or  routine.  For 
she  had  remained,  even  at  thirty-three,  the  merely 
bigger  sister;  an  atmosphere  of  schoolroom  tea  and 
the  nurture  of  rabbits  and  guinea-pigs  still  hanging 
about  her;  her  resource  and  cheerfulness  seeming 
concerned  always  with  the  organizing  of  games,  the 
care  of  pets,  and  the  soothing  of  unimportant  dis 
tresses.  Tall,  in  her  scant  tweed  skirts,  her  much- 
repaired  white  blouse,  her  slender  feet  laced  into 
heavy  boots,  gardening  gloves  on  her  hands,  so 
Rosamund  had  last  seen  her,  a  year  ago,  just  be 
fore  Charlie  had  been  killed,  when  she  had  straight 
ened  herself  from  moulding  potatoes  in  the  lawn 
borders  and  had  come  forward  with  her  pretty 
smile  to  greet  her  visitor  and  take  her  in  to  tea. 
Frank  had  been  killed  since  then,  as  well  as  Charlie, 
but  at  that  time,  for  both  households,  the  war  was 
splendid  adventure  rather  than  sorrow. 

Mr.  Braithwaite,  in  the  sunny,  shabby  drawing- 
room,  had  stumbled  up  among  his  wrappings,  to 
point  out  to  her  his  accurate  flags,  advancing  or 
retreating  on  the  many  maps  that  were  pinned 
upon  the  walls.  Frank's  last  letter  had  been  read 

[265] 


E  7 EN  ING  PRIMROSES 

to  her,  and  Dick's  and  Eustace's;  and  Pamela  had 
come  in  and  out,  helping  the  maid  with  the  tea 
(the  Braithwaite  maids  were  always  as  cheerful 
and  desultory  as  the  family,  and  Rosamund  never 
remembered  seeing  one  of  them  who  had  not  he! 
cap  askew  or  her  cuffs  untied),  standing  to  butter 
the  bread  herself,  the  side  of  the  loaf  before  cut 
ting  the  slice,  after  her  old  schoolroom  fashion; 
her  discreet  yet  generous  use  of  the  butter  —  the 
crust  covered  to  a  nicety  and  no  lumps  on  the 
crumb  —  seeming  to  express  her,  as  did  the  pouring 
out  of  the  excellent  tea,  drawn  to  a  point  and  never 
over,  and  the  pleasant,  capacious  cups  with  their 
gilt  rims  and  the  immersed  rose  which,  as  one 
drank,  discovered  itself  at  the  bottom. 

A  sweet,  old-fashioned,  homely  creature;  like  the 
evening  primroses;  like  them,  obliterated,  unno 
ticed  in  daylight;  and  like  them  now,  becoming 
visible,  becoming  personal,  even  becoming  tragic 
at  this  nocturnal  hour;  for  was  this  really  Pamela, 
sweet,  prosaic  Pamela,  sobbing  so  broken-heartedly 
beside  her?  How  meagre,  intellectual,  and  unsub 
stantial  her  own  grief  seemed  to  Rosamund  as  she 
listened,  almost  aghast,  her  arm  about  Pamela's 
shoulders;  and  her  instinct  told  her:  "It  is  a  man. 
It  is  some  one  she  loves  —  not  Frank,  but  some  one 
she  loves  far  more  —  who  is  dead.  It  is  something 
final  and  fatal  that  has  broken  her  down  like  this." 
And  aloud  she  repeated:  "Can  you  tell  me,  Pamela 
dear?  Please  try  to  tell  me.  It  may  help  you  to 
tell."  Her  own  heart  was  shaken  and  tears  were  in 
her  own  eyes. 

Between  her  sobs  Pamela  answered,  "I  love  him 
—  I  love  him  so  much.  He  is  dead.  And  some 
times  I  can't  bear  it." 

[266] 


E  7 EN  ING  PRIMROSES 

Rosamund  had  never  heard  of  a  love-affair.  But 
these  years  of  war  had  done  many  things,  had 
found  out  even  the  hidden  Pamelas. 

"I  did  n't  know.  —  My  poor  child!  —  I  never 
heard.  Were  you  engaged?" 

She  had  Pamela's  ringless  hand  in  hers. 

"No!  No!  It  wasn't  that.  No  —  I've  never 
had  any  one  like  that.  No  one  ever  knew.  He 
never  knew."  Pamela  lifted  her  head.  Her  face 
seemed  now  only  a  message  emerging  from  the 
darkness;  shadowed  light  upon  the  shadow,  it  was 
expression  rather  than  form.  "May  I  tell  you?" 
she  said.  "Can  you  forgive  my  telling  you  —  here 
and  now,  —  and  to-night,  when  you  Ve  come  to  be 
with  him?  It  was  Mr.  Hayward  I  loved.  I've 
always  loved  him.  He  has  been  all  my  life.  Ever 
since  you  first  came  here  to  live." 

Rosamund  gazed  at  her,  and  through  all  her 
astonishment  there  ran  an  undertone  of  accom 
plished  presage.  Yes,  that  was  it,  of  course.  Had 
she  not  been  feeling  it,  seeking  it  all  the  eve 
ning? —  or  had  it  not  been  seeking  her?  Here  it 
was,  then,  the  lacking  emptiness.  Desolate  voids 
seemed  to  open  upon  her  in  Pamela's  shadowy 
eyes.  She  tightly  held  the  ringless  hand  and  felt, 
presently,  that  she  pressed  it  against  her  heart 
where  something  pierced  her.  Was  it  pity  for 
Pamela?  or  for  Charlie?  This  was  his;  had  always 
been  his.  And  Pamela,  who  had  had  nothing,  had 
lost  everything.  "My  dear!"  she  murmured. 

"Oh,  how  kind  you  are!"  said  Pamela.  She  sat 
quiet,  looking  down  at  their  two  hands  held  against 
Rosamund's  heart.  And  with  all  the  austerity  of 
her  grief  she  had  never  been  more  childlike  in 
Rosamund's  eyes.  Like  a  child,  once  the  barriers  of 

[267] 


I 


E  FEN  ING  PRIMROSES 

shyness  were  down  and  trust  established,  she  would 
confide  everything. 

Rosamund  knew  how  it  must  help  her  to  confide. 
"Tell  me  if  you  will,"  she  said.  "I  am  glad  you 
loved  him,  if  it  has  not  hurt  you  too  much.  You 
understand,  don't  you,  that  I  must  be  glad  —  for 
him?" 

Yes,  oh,  yes;  I  understand.  How  beautiful  of 
ou  to  see  it  all!  —  Even  though  it's  so  little,  it  is 
is;  something  he  did;  and  so  you  must  care.  But 
I  don't  think  there's  much  to  tell;  nothing  about 
him  that  you  don't  know." 

"  About  you,  then.  About  what  he  was  to  you." 

"That  would  simply  be  my  whole  life,"  said 
Pamela.  "It's  so  wonderful  of  you  to  understand 
and  not  to  blame  me.  So  many  people  would  have 
thought  it  wrong;  but  it  came  before  I  knew  what  it 
was  going  to  be,  and  I  never  can  feel  that  it  was 
wrong.  He  never  knew.  And  even  if  he  had,  it 
could  n't  have  made  any  difference.  It  must  be 
because  of  that  that  I  can  tell  you.  If  you  had  n't 
been  so  happy,  if  it  had  n't  been  so  perfect  —  for 
you  and  him  —  I  don't  think  that  I  could  have 
told.  I  should  just  have  rushed  away  when  you 
came  in  and  hidden  from  you." 

"Why?"  asked  Rosamund  after  a  moment.  She 
heard  something  in  her  own  voice  that  Pamela 
would  not  hear. 

"I  don't  quite  know  why,"  said  Pamela;  "but 
don't  you  feel  it  too?  Perhaps  if  it  had  n't  been  so 
perfect,  even  my  little  outside  love  might  have 
hurt  you  —  or  troubled  you  —  to  hear  about.  But 
I  see  now  that  you  are  the  only  person  in  the  world 
who  could  care  to  hear.  It  is  a  comfort  to  tell  you. 
I  am  so  glad  you  came."  Pamela  turned  her  eyes 

[  268] 


E  FEN  ING  PRIMROSES 

upon  her  and  it  was  almost  with  her  smile.  "When 
I  see  you  like  this  I  can  believe  that  he  is  here, 
listening  with  you,  and  sorry  for  me,  too." 

How  like  an  evening  primrose  she  was!  Rosa 
mund  could  see  her  clearly  now:  the  candid  oval 
of  the  face,  the  eyes,  the  innocent,  child  forehead 
with  thick,  fair  hair  falling  across  it. 

"Yes.   Go  on,"  she  said,  smiling  back. 

She  was  not  worthy  of  Pamela,  and  poor  Charlie 
was  not  worthy  of  her;  but  no  human  being  is 
worthy  of  a  flower.  And  though  so  innocent,  she 
was  not  stupid;  subtlety  like  a  fragrance  was  about 
her  as  she  said,  "You  can  comfort  me  because  you 
have  so  much  to  comfort  with." 

"So  much  grief,  or  so  much  remembered  hap 
piness?" 

"They  go  together,  don't  they?"  said  Pamela. 
"Every  sort  of  fulness.  But  I  need  n't  try  to  get 
it  clear.  You  understand.  I  always  thought  that 
perhaps  people  who  had  fulness  could  n't;  now  I 
see  that  I  was  mistaken." 

"Have  you  been  very  unhappy,  dear  child?" 

"Until  now?  While  he  was  here?  Oh,  no,  I  have 
been  lonely.  Even  before  he  came,  even  though 
my  life  was  so  crowded,  it  was  rather  lonely.  I 
never  had  any  one  of  my  own,  for  myself.  But 
afterwards,  even  if  I  felt  lonely,  I  was  happy.  At 
least,  after  just  at  first.  Because,  just  at  first,  it 
was  miserable,  for  I  could  n't  help  longing  to  see 
him  more  and  to  have  him  like  me  more,  and  that 
made  me  understand  that  I  was  in  love  with  him, 
and  I  was  frightened.  I  can't  explain  clearly  about 
it,  even  to  myself.  But  I  was  very,  very  unhappy. 
Perhaps  you  remember  the  time  when  I  was 
twenty,  and  got  so  run  down,  and  they  sent  me  to 

[269] 


E  7 EN  ING  PRIMROSES 

Germany  to  my  old  governess  —  the  only  time  I 
ever  went  away  from  home,  out  of  England.  It  was 
a  miserable  time.  I  tried  not  to  think  of  him  and 
not  to  care.  But  I  had  to  come  back,  and  he  was 
there,  and  I  knew  I  could  n't  stop  caring,  and  that 
all  I  could  do  about  it  was  to  try  to  be  better  be 
cause  of  him,  —  you  know,  —  and  make  people 
happier,  and  not  think  of  myself,  but  of  him  and 
them.  And  everything  changed  after  that.  I  was 
never  frightened  any  more,  and  though  perhaps  it 
was  n't  exactly  happiness,  it  was,  sometimes,  I  be 
lieve,  almost  better.  I  can't  explain  it,  but  what  I 
mean  is  in  some  poetry.  I  never  cared  much  about 
poetry  till  he  came.  Then  I  seemed  to  understand 
things  I'd  never  understood  before,  and  to  feel 
everything  that  was  beautiful. 

"  You  remember  how  dear  he  was  to  us  all  —  to 
the  boys  and  me.  I  always  shared  in  everything 
they  did.  Every  bit  of  this  country  is  full  of  him; 
I  could  never  bear  to  go  away  and  leave  it.  I  want 
always  to  stay  here  till  I  die.  —  Flowers  and  birds 
—  wasn't  he  wonderful  about  them?  And  our 
walks  in  the  woods!  He  saw  everything,  and  made 
us  see  it.  I  never  woke  in  the  morning  without 
thinking,  Will  he  come  to-day  ?  What  will  he  say  and 
do?  I  was  never  tired  of  watching  hrm  and  listen 
ing  to  him.  All  his  little  ways  —  you  know.  When 
I  pleased  him,  —  sometimes  I  saw  the  bird  we  were 
watching  for  first,  or  caught  my  trout  well,  —  it 
was  a  red-letter  day.  And  in  big  things  —  to  feel 
I  should  have  pleased  him  if  he'd  known.  It  was 
he  who  helped  me  in  every  way,  without  knowing 
it.  And  I  took  more  and  more  joy  in  you.  At  first 
I  had  felt  dreadfully  shy  with  you  —  and  afraid  of 
you.  You  were  so  clever,  with  all  your  books  and 

1 270] 


EVENING  PRIMROSES 

music  and  friends,  and  you  did  n't  seem  to  need 
anything.  But  afterwards  you  were  so  kind,  that, 
though  I  was  always  shy,  I  was  not  frightened  any 
longer.  I  used  to  think  about  you  so  much,  and 
imagine  what  he  felt  about  you  —  and  you  about 
him.  —  You  won't  mind  my  saying  it,  I  know. 
Perhaps  you  remember  the  way  I  used  so  often,  in 
the  evenings,  to  walk  past  with  the  children,  and 
say  good-night  over  the  wall.  That  was  to  see  you 
and  him  walking  together.  You  were  so  beautiful! 
You  are  far  and  far  away  the  most  beautiful  person 
I've  ever  known.  I  always  noticed  everything  you 
wore,  and  how  your  hair  was  done.  I  was  glad  when 
you  took  it  down  from  the  knot  and  had  it  all 
at  the  back,  as  you  do  now.  And  the  lovely  pale 
blue  dress,  with  the  little  flounces  —  do  you  re 
member? —  a  summer  dress  of  lawn.  I  did  love 
that.  And  the  white  linen  coats  and  skirts,  and  the 
big  white  hat  with  the  lemon-coloured  bow.  Your 
very  shoes  —  those  grey  ones  you  always  had, 
with  the  low  heels  and  little  silver  buckles.  No  one 
had  such  lovely  clothes.  And  the  way  you  poured 
out  tea  and  looked  across  the  table  at  one.  Always 
like  a  beautiful  muse  —  you  don't  mind  my  saying 
it?  —  a  little  above  everything,  and  apart,  and 
quietly  looking  on.  —  How  I  understood  what  he 
felt  for  you!  I  felt  it,  too,  I  think,  with  him." 

Yes,  dear  flower  and  child,  she  had:  offering  to 
Charlie  that  last  tribute  of  a  woman's  worship,  the 
imaginative  love  of  the  woman  he  loves;  cherishing 
the  cruelly  sweet  closeness  of  that  piercing  com 
munity.  How  she  had  idealized  them  both.  How 
she  had  idealized  Charlie's  love.  Charlie  had  never 
seen  her  like  this.  Charlie  had  never  dreamed  of 
her  as  a  muse,  above,  apart,  and  quietly  watching. 

[271 1 


EFENING  PRIMROSES 

Why,  with  Pamela's  Charlie  she  herself  could  al 
most  have  been  in  love! 

"What  did  you  talk  about,  you  and  he,"  she 
asked,  "when  you  were  together?"  Their  sylvan 
life,  Pamela's  and  Charlie's,  was  almost  as  unknown 
to  her  as  that  of  the  birds  they  watched.  She  had 
almost  a  soft  small  hope  that  perhaps  Pamela  could 
show  her  something  she  had  missed.  "Did  you  ever 
talk  about  poetry,  for  instance?" 

"No;  never  about  things  like  that,"  Pamel'a 
answered.  "He  talked  more  to  the  boys  than  to  me; 
he  talked  to  us  all  together  —  about  what  we  were 
doing.  But  I  used  to  love  listening  to  him  when  he 
came  and  talked  to  father.  Politics,  you  know;  and 
the  way  things  ought  to  be  done.  He  was  a  great 
deal  discouraged,  you  remember,  by  the  way  they 
were  being  done.  All  those  unjust  taxes,  you  know. 
He  wanted,  he  used  always  to  say,  to  give  to  the 
poor  himself;  he  loved  taking  care  of  them.  But  he 
hated  that  his  money  should  be  taken  from  him 
like  that,  against  his  will.  And  he  always,  always 
foresaw  the  war;  always  knew  that  Germany  was 
plotting,  and  how  England  swarmed  with  spies. 
He  thought  we  ought  to  have  declared  war  upon 
her  long  ago  and  struck  first.  —  I  'm  rather  glad  we 
did  n't,  are  n't  you  ?  because  then,  in  a  way,  we 
should  have  been  in  the  wrong  rather  than  they;  but 
of  course  he  felt  it  as  a  statesman,  not  like  an  igno 
rant  woman.  —  You  think  Germany  plotted,  too?" 

"Yes,  oh,  yes."  How  glad  Rosamund  was  to  be 
able  to  think  it,  to  be  able,  here,  with  a  clear  con 
science,  to  remember  that,  on  the  theme  of  Ger 
many's  craft  and  crime,  she  and  Charlie  had 
thought  quite  sufficiently  alike.  "But  I  am  with 
you  about  not  striking  first." 

1 2/2] 


EVENING  PRIMROSES 

"Are  you  really?"  There  was  surprise  in  Pa 
mela's  voice.  She  did  not  dwell  on  the  slight  per 
plexity.  "Of  course,  he  always  worsted  father  if  he 
disagreed.  It  was  rather  wicked  of  me,  but  I  could 
n't  help  enjoying  seeing  father  worsted.  He'd 
never  thought  things  out,  as  Mr.  Hayward  had. 
But  that's  what  he  talked  about  —  things  like  that 
—  and  you." 

"Me?"  Rosamund's  voice  was  gentle,  medita 
tive  —  her  old  voice  of  the  encounters  with  Charlie. 
How  she  could  hear  him  through  all  Pamela's  can 
did  recitative! 

"He  was  always  thinking  about  you.  'My  wife 
says  so  and  so.  My  wife  agrees  with  me  about  it.  I 
brought  my  wife  last  night  to  see  it  as  I  do.'  Oh, 
you  were  with  him  in  everything!  It  was  so  beau 
tiful  to  see  and  hear!  I  used  to  imagine  that  the 
Brownings  were  like  that  —  after  I  read  their  lives. 
He  was  a  sort  of  poet,  was  n't  he?  Any  one  so  lov 
ing  and  so  happy  is  a  sort  of  poet  —  even  if  they 
don't  write  poetry.  Down  in  the  meadows  one  day, 
when  we  were  watching  lapwings,  he  and  I  and  the 
boys,  —  he  wanted  to  show  us  a  nest;  you  know 
how  difficult  they  are  to  find,  —  you  passed  up  on 
the  hillside,  with  Philip  and  Giles.  We  could  see 
you  against  the  larchwood,  they  in  their  holland 
smocks  and  you  in  white,  with  the  white-and-yel- 
low  hat.  I  shall  never  forget  the  way  he  stood  up 
and  smiled,  his  eyes  following  you.  'There's  Rosa 
mund  and  the  progeny,'  he  said.  —  You  know  the 
dear,  funny  way  he  had  of  saying  things." 

Yes  —  she  knew  it.  Yet  tears  had  risen  to  Rosa 
mund's  eyes.  Dear  old  Charlie;  dear,  old,  tiresome 
Charlie!  The  tears  had  come  as  she  saw  him  stand 
ing  to  look  after  her  and  his  boys;  but  there  was 

[273 1 


E  FEN  ING  PRIMROSES 

nothing  more,  nothing  that  she  could  give  to  Pa 
mela,  not  one  crumb  of  enrichment  from  what 
Pamela  believed  to  be  her  great  store.  Pamela 
had  seen  all  —  and  more  than  all  —  that  there  was 
to  see. 

In  her  own  silence  now  she  was  aware  of  a  grow 
ing  oppression.  She  was  too  silent,  even  for  one 
mute  from  the  depth  and  sacredness  of  memory. 
Might  not  such  silence  seem  to  reprove  Pa 
mela's  flooding  confidence?  She  struggled  with  her 
thoughts.  "The  lapwings?"  she  heard  herself  mur 
muring.  "  I  remember  his  showing  me  a  nest.  How 
he  loved  birds  and  how  much  he  knew  about  them ! 
Were  n't  you  with  us  on  the  day  we  put  up  all  the 
nesting-boxes  here?  Do  you  remember  how  he 
planned  for  the  placing  of  each  one,  each  bird  to 
have  its  own  appropriate  domain?  It  was  a  lovely 
day,  in  very  early  spring." 

"Oh  —  do  you  remember  that?"  How  Pamela 
craved  the  crumb  was  shown  by  her  lightened  face; 
it  was  almost  happy,  as  it  turned  to  Rosamund, 
with  its  sense  of  recovered  treasures.  "Very  early- 
spring  —  March.  Snowdrops  were  up  over  there, 
—  and  there,  —  and  there  were  daffodils  at  the 
foot  of  the  wall.  You  were  in  blue:  a  frieze  coat 
and  skirt  of  Japanese  blue,  with  a  grey  silk  scarf 
and  a  little  soft  grey  hat  with  a  blue  wing  in  it; 
and  you  said,  —  you  were  standing  just  over  there, 
near  the  pond,  —  '  We  can  always  count  on  tits.' 
But  you  did  get  robins,  too,  and  thrushes  in  the 
big  boxes;  and  then  the  splendid  year  when  the  nut 
hatches  came  to  the  box  down  in  the  orchard.  And 
you  were  tying  up  one  box,  but  it  was  too  high  and 
he  came  and  did  it  for  you.  I  can  see  you  both  so 
plainly,  your  hands  stretching  up  against  the  sky. 

[274] 


EVENING  PRIMROSES 

Tall  as  you  are  he  was  taller;  his  head  seemed  to 
tower  up  into  the  branches.  Such  a  blue  sky  it  was ! 
And  afterwards  we  had  tea  in  the  drawing-room, 
and  the  tea  was  n't  strong  enough  for  him,  and  you 
liked  China  and  he  Indian  tea.  And  you  teased  him 
and  said  that  you  had  always  to  make  him  the  little 
brown  pot  all  for  himself.  He  said,  'Tea  never 
tastes  so  right  as  out  of  a  brown  pot.'  There  were 
white  tulips  growing  in  a  bowl  on  the  tea-table. 
And  then  you  played  to  us.  And  you  sang  —  'I 
need  no  star  in  heaven  to  guide  me.'  He  was  so  fond 
of  that.  Oh,  do  you  remember  it  all,  too?" 

All  —  all.  Rosamund,  though  her  tears  fell,  felt 
her  cheek  flushing  in  the  darkness.  How  often  he 
had  asked  for  "I  need  no  star  in  heaven  to  guide 
me"!  How  often  she  had  sung  it  to  him,  rejoicing 
so  soon,  while  she  threw  the  proper  tumultuous  fer 
vour  that  Charlie  loved  into  the  foolish  air,  in  the 
atoning  thought  that  already  Philip's  favourite  was 
"Der  Nussbaum"  and  that  even  little  Giles  asked 
for  "the  sheep  song,"  the  bleak,  beautiful  old  Scot 
tish  strain:  "Ca*  the  yowes  to  the  knowes,"  with 
its  sweetest  drop  to  "my  bonnie  dearie."  "Oh  — 
give  us  something  cheerful!"  Charlie  would  ex 
claim  after  it. 

"I  remember  it  all,  dear,"  she  answered;  and 
there  was  silence  for  a  while. 

"How  do  you  bear  it?"  Pamela  whispered  sud 
denly. 

The  hour,  the  stillness,  the  hands  that  held  her, 
drew  her  past  the  last  barrier.  Her  broken  heart 
yearned  for  the  comfort  that  the  greater  loss  alone 
could  give.  What  was  the  strength  that  enabled 
his  wife  to  sit  there  so  quietly,  so  gently,  so  full  of 
peace  and  pity? 

[275  ] 


E  FEN  ING  PRIMROSES 

Rosamund  felt  herself  faltering,  stumbling,  as 
she  heard  the  inevitable  question,  and  knew,  as  it 
came,  that  even  Pamela's  heavenly  blindness  might 
not  protect  her,  unless  she  could  be  very  careful, 
from  horrid  loss  or  suspicion.  To  touch  with  a 
breath  of  her  daylight  reality  that  silver  world  of 
recollection  would  be  to  desecrate.  Could  she  hold 
her  breath  and  tread  softly  while  she  answered? 
Yes,  surely.  Surely  she,  who  had  hidden  through 
all  the  years  from  Charlie,  could  hide  from  Pamela, 
although  Pamela  already  was  nearer  than  Charlie 
and  knew  her  better  than  he  had  ever  done.  All 
the  old  strength  and  resource  welled  up  in  her,  pro 
tecting  this  lovely  thing,  as,  after  the  long  moment, 
not  looking  at  Pamela,  but  into  Charlie's  garden, 
she  found  the  right  answer. 

"You  see,  dear,  it  is  so  different  with  me.  You 
have  only  your  memories.  I  have  the  boys  —  his 
boys  —  to  live  for." 

It  was  right.  It  was  the  only  answer.  She  heard 
Pamela's  long,  soft  breaths,  full  of  a  gentle  awe, 
and  felt  her  hand  more  tightly  clasped.  Once  the 
right  step  was  taken,  it  was  easier  to  go  on: 

"I  want  to  tell  you  why  I  am  so  glad  to  have 
found  you  here,  Pamela  dear.  You'll  understand, 
I  think,  when  I  say  that  motherhood  lives  in  the 
present  and  future,  and  is  almost  cruel,  cruel  to 
everything  not  itself,  for  it  forgets  the  past  in  the 
present.  Do  you  see,"  —  she  found  the  beautiful 
untruth,  —  "he  is  so  much  in  them  for  me,  that 
I  might  almost  forget  him  in  them  —  forget  to 
mourn  him,  as  one  would  if  they  were  not  there.  So 
do  you  see  why  it  comforts  me  to  know  that,  while 
I  must  go  on  into  the  future  with  them,  you  will  be 
keeping  him  here  and  remembering?" 

1 276] 


E  FEN  ING  PRIMROSES 

She  could  look  at  Pamela  now,  in  safety,  and  she 
turned  to  her,  finding  rapt  eyes  upon  her. 

"  Come  here  often,  won't  you,  when  I  'm  away  as 
well  as  when  I'm  here.  We  must  make  it  all  look 
again  as  it  did  when  he  was  with  us  —  flowers  and 
trees  and  bird-boxes.  You  will  help  me  in  it  all  and 
you  will  think  of  him  here  and  love  him.  I  know 
what  happiness  you  meant  to  him  —  more  than  he 
was  aware  of.  You  were  a  beautiful  part  of  his  life. 
You  say  you  were  always,  for  him,  only  together, 
with  the  boys.  That  is  only  partly  true.  He  used 
often  to  speak  of  you  to  me,  the  little  passing  things 
people  say  of  any  one  they  are  very  fond  of  and  take 
for  granted.  He  appreciated  you  and  counted 
upon  you.  I  came  here  so  sad,  Pamela,  so  burdened. 
I've  never  been  sadder  in  my  life  than  I  was  to 
night  as  I  walked  here.  And  you  have  lifted  it  all. 
It  makes  all  the  difference  to  know  that  you  are 
here,  in  his  garden,  remembering  him.  More  dif 
ference  than  I  can  say." 

It  was  an  unutterable  gratitude  that,  with  her 
tears,  with  love  and  pity  and  reverence,  welled  up 
in  her,  seeing  what  Pamela  had  done.  The  garden 
was  no  longer  empty,  and  Charlie  not  forgotten.  In 
the  night  of  his  death  and  disappearance  this  flower 
had  become  visible.  Always,  when  she  thought  of 
him,  she  would  think  of  evening  primroses  and  of 
Pamela,  so  that  it  would  be  with  tenderness,  with 
the  understanding,  homely,  unexacting,  consecrat 
ing,  that  Pamela  gave;  Pamela  herself  becoming 
a  gift  from  Charlie;  emerging  from  the  darkness, 
evident  and  beautiful,  —  almost  another  child 
whose  future  she  must  carry  in  her  heart;  though 
the  only  gift  she  could  give  her  now,  in  return  for 
all  that  she  had  given,  was  the  full  and  free  posses- 

[277] 


E  FEN  ING  PRIMROSES 

sion  of  the  past,  where,  outside  the  garden  wall, 
she  had  been  a  wistful  onlooker.  She  felt  that  she 
opened  the  gate,  drew  Pamela  in,  and  put  into  her 
keeping  all  the  keys  that  had  weighed  so  heavily 
in  her  unfitted  hands. 


AUTUMN 


^  you  need  is  a  complete 

\  change,  and  quiet,"  said  his 
cousin  Dorothy. 

Guy,  indeed,  in  spite  of  his 
efforts  to  keep  up  appearances, 
was  a  dismal  figure.  He  had 
been  passing  the  teacups  and  the  bread  and  butter, 
enduring  all  the  jests  about  sugar-rations  and  mar 
garine,  and  enduring,  which  was  so  much  worse, 
the  complacencies  over  the  approaching  end  of  the 
war.  His  haggard  face,  narrow-jawed  and  high- 
foreheaded,  expressed  this  endurance  rather  than 
any  social  amenity,  and  he  was  aware  that  Aunt 
Emily  could  hardly  feel  that  the  presence  of  her 
poet  and  soldier  nephew  added  much  to  her  tea- 
party.  Indeed,  the  chattering,  cheerful  women 
affected  his  nerves  almost  as  painfully  as  did  the 
sound  of  the  motor-buses  when  —  every  day  it 
happened  —  he  stopped  on  the  curb,  after  leaving 
his  office  in  Whitehall,  and  wondered  how  long  it 
would  take  him  to  summon  courage  to  cross  the 
street.  He  felt,  then,  like  breaking  down  and  cry 
ing;  and  he  felt  like  it  now  when  they  said,  "Is  n't 
it  all  too  splendid!" 

Cousin  Dorothy  was  as  chattering  and  as  cheer- 

[279] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

ful  as  the  rest  of  them,  and  she  had  every  reason  to 
be,  he  remembered,  with  Tom,  her  fiance,  ensconced 
in  Paris,  safe  after  all  his  perils.  Dorothy,  though 
like  everybody  else  she  had  worked  hard  during 
the  war,  had  seen  nothing  and  lost  nothing.  And 
she  had  never  had  any  imagination.  All  the  same, 
he  was  thankful  when  she  rescued  him  from  the 
woman  who  would  talk  to  him  idiotically  about  his 
poetry  (she  evidently  had  n't  understood  a  word 
of  it),  and  took  him  into  a  quiet  nook  near  the 
piano. 

It  might,  then,  have  been  mere  consanguinity, 
for  he  had  never  before  found  intimacy  possible 
where  Dorothy  was  concerned;  or  it  might  have 
been  a  symptom  of  his  state  (his  being  at  Aunt 
Emily's  tea-party  at  all  was  that !) ;  but,  at  all  events 
after  admitting  that  Mrs.  Dickson  had  been  bor 
ing  him,  he  found  himself  presently  confessing  his 
terrors  about  the  motor-buses,  his  terror  of  the  dark, 
his  sleeplessness  and  general  disintegration.  His 
nervous  laugh  was  a  concession  to  Dorothy's  pos 
sible  misunderstanding;  but  as  he  went  on,  he  felt 
himself  almost  loving  her  for  the  matter-of-factness 
she  infused  into  her  sympathy.  After  all,  even  good 
old  Dorothy  was  n't  stupid  enough  to  suspect  him 
of  cowardice;  and  although,  from  a  military  point 
of  view,  he  had  made  such  a  mess  of  it  (invalided 
home  again  and  again  on  account  of  digestive  com 
plaints,  and  finally,  last  spring,  transferred  to  his 
small  official  post  in  London),  to  any  one,  really, 
who  had  at  all  followed  his  career,  it  would  be  appar 
ent  that  no  one  could  have  stuck  harder  to  the 
loathly  job.  He  had  felt  it  that,  and  only  that,  even 
while,  prompted  by  pride,  he  had  made  his  effort 
to  enlist,  in  the  first  months  of  the  war.  It  had  been 

f  280  1 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

with  a  deep  relief  that  he  had  found  himself  at  once 
rejected  and  free  to  stay  behind,  free  to  serve  hu 
manity  with  his  gift  rather  than  with  his  ineffi 
ciency;  for  he  took  his  poetic  vocation  with  a  youth 
ful  seriousness.  And  when,  later  on,  through  one  of 
the  blunders  of  medical  examinations,  he  was  drawn 
into  the  net  of  conscription,  no  one  could  have 
denied  that  he  marched  off  to  the  shambles  with 
unflinching  readiness. 

Dorothy,  he  saw,  took  courage  all  along  for 
granted:  "It's  simply  a  case  of  shell-shock,"  she 
said,  as  if  it  were  her  daily  fare;  "you're  queer  and 
jumpy,  and  you  can't  stand  noise.  It's  quite  like 
Tommy." 

He  could  n't  associate  Tommy,  short-nosed, 
round-headed,  red-eared  Tommy,  with  anything  of 
the  sort,  and  said  so  in  some  resentment.  But 
Dorothy  assured  him  that  for  some  months  —  just 
a  year  ago  —  Tommy  had  been  at  home  on  sick 
leave,  and  really  bad  enough  for  anything.  "He 
suffered  in  every  way  just  as  you  do." 

Guy  was  quite  sure  he  had  n't,  but  he  did  not 
want  to  argue  about  it.  For  nothing  in  the  world 
would  he  have  defined  to  Dorothy  what  he  really 
suffered. 

"It's  country  air  you  need;  country  food  and 
country  quiet,"  Dorothy  went  on.  "You  can  get 
away?" 

"Oh,  yes;  I  can  get  away  all  right.  Old  Forsyth 
is  most  decent  about  it.  He  was  telling  me  this 
morning  that  I  ought  to  take  a  month." 

"I  wonder  if  Mrs.  Baldwin  could  have  you  at 
Thatches,"  Dorothy  mused.  "Tommy  got  well 
directly." 

"Mrs.  Baldwin?"  His  voice,  he  knew,  expressed 

[  281  ] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

an  unflattering  scepticism,  but  he  could  n't  help 
it.  "Is  she  at  home  —  an  institution?"  He  saw 
Mrs.  Baldwin,  hatefully  tactful,  in  a  Red  Cross 
uniform.  "No,  thank  you,  my  dear." 

"Of  course  not.  What  do  you  take  me  for?" 
Dorothy  kept  her  competent  eyes  upon  him.  "It's 
not  even  a  P.G.  place  —  at  all  events,  not  a  regular 
one,  though  of  course  you  do  pay  for  your  keep. 
She  has  very  narrow  means  and  takes  friends  some 
times,  and,  since  the  war,  it's  just  happened  —  by 
people  telling  each  other,  as  I  'm  telling  you  —  to  be 
shell-shock  cases  rather  particularly.  It's  a  lovely 
country,  and  a  dear,  quaint  little  cottage,  and  she 
does  you  most  awfully  well,  Tommy  said." 

"I  don't  like  the  idea  of  settling  down  like  that 
on  a  stranger." 

"But  she  would  n't  be  a  stranger.  You'd  go 
through  me,  and  I  feel  as  if  I  knew  her  already 
through  Tommy.  He  said  he  was  at  home  at  once. 
'Cosy,'  was  how  he  expressed  it.  And  you  get 
honey  on  your  bread  at  tea  and  cream  in  your  coffee 
at  breakfast,  and  all  sorts  of  delightful  things 
en  casserole,  that  she  cooks  with  her  own  hands, 
quite  equal,  Tommy  said,  to  the  French.  And, 
Tommy  knows,  now,  you  see." 

"It's  Mrs.  Baldwin  herself  who  frightens  me. 
She  frightens  me  more  than  the  motor-buses  in 
Whitehall." 

"That's  just  what  she  won't  do.  She's  perfectly 
sweet.  Cosy.  Middle-aged.  A  widow.  Her  nice 
old  father  lives  with  her,  and  Tommy  liked  him  so 
much,  too.  You  help  her  to  garden,  and  with  the 
bees,  you  know.  And  the  old  father  plays  chess 
with  you  in  the  evenings.  There's  a  stream  near 
by  where  you  can  fish  if  you  want  to.  It's  late  for 

282 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

that,  of  course;  but  Tommy  got  some  quite  good 
sport;  he  was  there  at  just  this  time  of  year.  And 
he  said  that  it  was  most  awfully  jolly  country, 
and  that  the  meadows  all  about  were  full  of  autumn 
crocuses." 

"Autumn  crocuses?  In  the  fields?  I've  never 
seen  them  wild." 

"They  do  grow  wild,  though,  in  some  parts  of 
England.  They  are  wild  there.  Tommy  particu 
larly  wrote  about  them.  He  said  one  walked  down 
to  the  stream  among  the  autumn  crocuses." 

Dorothy  was  baiting  her  hook  very  prettily,  and 
he  gloomily  smiled  his  recognition  of  it.  "They  do 
sound  attractive,"  he  owned.  He  had  n't  imagined 
Tom  a  man  to  notice  crocuses,  and  he  was  the  more 
inclined  to  trust  his  good  impressions  further.  After 
all,  apart  from  Mrs.  Baldwin  and  her  father,  the 
country,  with  honey,  cream,  and  autumn  crocuses, 
was  a  happy  combination,  if  he  had  been  in  condi 
tion  for  feeling  anything  happy. 

What  would  Dorothy  have  thought  of  him,  could 
she  have  known  that,  while  they  talked,  her  rosy, 
bonnie  face  kept  constantly,  before  his  haunted 
eyes,  dissolving  into  a  skull?  Faces  had  a  way  of 
doing  this  with  him  since  his  last  encounter  with 
the  war  in  the  spring.  And  all  the  people  talking 
in  the  room  squeaked  and  gibbered.  How  could 
they  go  on  talking  ?  How  could  they  go  on  living  — 
after  what  had  happened?  How  could  he?  The 
familiar  nausea  rose  in  him  even  as  he  forced  him 
self  to  smile  and  say,  "Well,  could  she  have  me  — 
Mrs.  Baldwin?" 

He  could  not  have  made  an  effort  to  find  a 
place  for  himself.  Such  efforts,  he  felt  sure,  would 
have  landed  him  at  some  God-forsaken  farmhouse 

(283  j 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

miles  from  the  station,  where  the  beds  were  damp 
and  the  meat  tough;  or,  even  worse,  at  a  Bourne 
mouth  hotel,  amid  orchestras  and  people  who  made 
a  point  of  dressing  for  dinner.  But,  if  some  one 
found  it  for  him,  he  would  let  himself  be  pushed  off. 

"I'm  sure  she  could,"  said  Dorothy  with  con 
viction.  "I  have  her  address  and  I'll  write  to 
night  and  tell  her  all  about  you :  that  you  're  a  ris 
ing  poet,  and  that  your  friends  and  relations  will 
be  so  grateful  if  she'll  do  for  you  what  she  did  for 
Tommy." 

He  had  an  ironic  glance  for  her  "rising."  His 
relations  —  and  Aunt  Emily  and  her  brood  were 
the  nearest  left  to  him  —  had  never  in  the  least 
taken  in  his  standing  or  realized  that  he  was, 
among  people  who  knew,  looked  upon  as  completely 
risen.  At  the  same  time,  sunken  was  what  he  felt 
himself;  drowned  deep;  too  deep,  he  sometimes 
thought,  for  recovery.  His  last  little  volume  had 
been  like  a  final  fight  for  breath.  He  had  written 
most  of  it  over  there,  after  Ronnie's  death  and 
before  his  own  decisive  breakdown,  and  he  knew 
it  a  result  as  much  of  his  malady  as  of  his  war 
experience. 

He  wondered  now,  anew,  whether  these  people 
had  really  read  the  poems.  If  they  had,  it  only 
showed  how  impervious  to  reality  they  must  re 
main.  And  there  had  actually  been  one,  written 
after  one  of  his  leaves,  called  "Eating  Bread-and- 
Butter,"  that  should  indeed  have  embarrassed 
them,  had  they  remembered  it,  inviting  them  to 
eat  it  with  him  in  a  trench  with  unburied  comrades 
lying  in  No-Man's  Land  before  them.  His  head, 
as  he  thought  of  that,  —  from  unburied  comrades 
passing  to  unburied  friends,  —  gave  a  nervous, 

[  284] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

backward  jerk,  for  he  had  told  himself  before  that 
he  must  stop  thinking  in  certain  directions;  and 
indeed  the  poems  had  helped  to  exorcise  the  ob 
session  at  the  time  when  they  had  been  written. 

All  the  same,  it  was  very  strange  —  such  a  poet 
at  such  a  tea-party.  He  had  plunged  into  Aunt 
Emily's  tea-party  as  he  plunged  nowadays  into 
anything  that  presented  itself  as  offering  distrac 
tion.  And  now,  as  he  said,  "Well,  if  you'll  put  it 
through,  I'll  go,  and  be  very  grateful  to  you,"  he 
felt  that  he  was  making  another  plunge  into  Mrs. 
Baldwin's  cottage. 

II 

IT  was  a  pretty  cottage  he  found,  as,  on  the  Sep 
tember  evening,  his  station  fly  drew  up  at  the 
wicket-gate.  They  had  come  a  long  way  from  the 
station,  and,  after  leaving  a  small  village,  the  wind 
ing  lane,  too,  had  seemed  long.  He  saw,  neverthe 
less,  as  he  alighted,  that  the  rustic  building,  old 
stones  below  and  modern  thatch  above,  could  not 
be  far  from  the  central  group  of  which  it  formed  an 
adjunct;  for  it  had  been  contrived,  by  devices  dear 
to  the  heart  of  the  week-ender,  from  two  or  three 
labourers'  cottages  thrown  into  one  and  covered 
all  over  with  the  capacious  and  brooding  thatch. 
"Quaint,"  Dorothy's  really  inevitable  word,  alto 
gether  expressed  it,  from  the  box  hedges  that  ran 
on  either  side  of  the  flagged  path,  to  the  pale  yellow 
hollyhocks  beside  the  door. 

A  round-cheeked  country  girl,  neatly  capped  and 
aproned,  opened  the  door  on  a  square,  rush-matted 
hall;  and  beyond  that  he  saw  a  room  full  of  the  sun 
set,  where  a  table  was  being  laid  and  from  which 
Mrs.  Baldwin  came  out  to  greet  him. 

[  285  ] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

She  was  not  tall,  and  had  thick,  closely  bound 
braids.  He  had  dreaded  finding  himself  at  once 
dealt  with  as  a  case;  but  Mrs.  Baldwin's  manner 
was  not  even  that  of  one  accustomed  to  paying 
guests.  Her  murmur  of  welcome,  her  questions 
about  his  journey,  her  mild  directions  as  she  led 
him  up  to  his  room,  "Be  careful  at  this  landing, 
the  level  of  the  floor  goes  up  and  the  beam  comes 
down  so  low,"  —  were  rather  those  of  a  shy  and 
entirely  unprofessional  hostess. 

He  thought,  as  soon  as  he  took  in  his  room,  with 
its  voile-de-Genes  hangings  and  dear  old  furniture, 
that  he  pleased  her  by  saying,  "What  a  delicious 
room!"  and  even  more  when,  on  going  to  the 
wide,  low,  mullioned  window,  its  panes  open  to  the 
west,  he  added,  "And  what  a  delicious  view!" 
There  were  meadows  and  tall  hedgerow  elms,  and, 
running  in  a  tranquil  band  of  brightness,  the  stream 
that  reflected  the  sky. 

She  did  not  say  that  she  was  glad  he  liked  it,  but 
her  very  gentle  smile  at  the  welcome  it  all  made  for 
him  was  part  of  the  welcome.  What  she  did  say 
was,  with  the  little  air  of  shy  preoccupation,  while 
she  wrung  her  finger-tips  together,  those  of  one  hand 
in  those  of  the  other,  "I  think  the  water's  very 
hot.  I  have  a  rather  young  little  maid.  You '11  tell 
me  if  you  want  anything.  Are  three  blankets  and 
the  down  quilt  enough  ?  The  nights  are  rather  cold 
already." 

He  said  that  three  would  be  perfect,  secure,  from 
his  glance  at  the  deep,  comely  bed,  that  they  would 
be  beautifully  thick  and  fleecy. 

"Then  you'll  come  down  to  us  when  you  are 
ready."  She  stood  in  the  door  to  look  round  again. 
"Matches  here,  you  see;  biscuits  in  the  little  earth- 

F  286  1 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

enware  box;  and  the  spirit-lamp  is  in  case  you  should 
wake  in  the  night  —  you  could  make  yourself  a  cup 
of  cocoa?  Everything  is  there  —  cocoa,  milk,  and 
sugar.  It  usually  sends  one  off  again  directly." 

It  was  all  the  slightly  shy  hostess  rather  than 
the  businesslike  soother  and  sustainer;  and,  no, 
it  was  n't  a  bit  cosy.  He  repudiated  that  word  in 
dignantly,  while  he  washed  —  the  water  was  very 
hot,  admirably  hot;  there  was  a  complacency  about 
cosy,  and  Mrs.  Baldwin  had  no  complacency, 
though  she  was,  for  all  her  shyness  and  the  uncon 
scious  gestures  of  physical  nervousness,  composed. 
Her  hands,  he  remembered,  recalling  their  little 
trick,  —  he  had  noticed  it  in  the  hall,  —  were  like 
a  child's;  not  the  hands  of  a  practical  housewife. 
Yet,  from  the  look  of  that  bed  (yes,  thank  heaven, 
a  box-spring  mattress !),  from  the  heat  of  the  water, 
and,  above  all,  the  deft  and  accessible  grouping  of 
the  spirit-lamp  and  its  adjuncts,  she  proved  that 
she  knew  how  to  make  one  comfortable. 

There  were  the  meadows  and  —  going  again 
to  the  window,  he  wondered  leaning  out,  —  could 
he  see  the  autumn  crocuses?  Yes,  surely;  even  at 
this  evening  hour  his  eyes  distinguished  the  pale 
yet  delicately  purpling  tint  that  streaked  the  pas 
toral  verdure.  What  a  delicious  place,  indeed!  He 
stood,  absorbed  in  looking  out,  until  the  maid  came 
to  say  that  supper  would  be  ready  in  five  minutes. 

The  long  room,  the  living-room,  —  for  it  com 
bined,  he  saw,  all  social  functions,  —  also  faced  the 
meadows  at  the  back  of  the  house,  and  the  prim 
rose  coloured  sunset  still  filled  it  as  he  entered.  Mrs. 
Baldwin  was  busying  herself  with  the  table,  and 
an  old  gentleman  with  a  very  long  white  beard  rose, 
with  much  dignity,  from  the  grandfather's  chair 

[  287] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

near  a  window-seat.  Mr.  Haseltine,  so  his  daughter 
named  him,  had  more  the  air  of  seeing  the  visitor 
as  a  P.G.,  perhaps  even  as  a  shell-shock  patient; 
but  he  was  a  nice  old  man,  Guy  felt,  although  his 
beard  was  too  long.  He  wore  a  brown  velveteen 
jacket,  and  Guy  surmised  that  he  might  have  been 
a  writer  or  scholar  of  some  not  very  significant  sort. 

"Yes,  we  think  ours  a  very  favored  nook  indeed," 
he  said,  as  Guy  again  praised  the  prospect.  "Yes; 
three  cottages.  Very  happily  contrived,  is  it  not? 
There  is  a  clever  builder  in  the  next  town.  He  kept 
the  old  fireplace,  you  see;  that  end  was  a  kitchen 
and  the  beams  are  all  the  old  ones.  Three  gar 
dens,  too,  thrown  into  one;  but  that  is  entirely 
my  daughter's  creation.  Pig-styes  used  to  be  in 
that  corner." 

Guy  looked  out  at  the  squares  of  colour,  the  low 
beds  of  mignonette,  the  phloxes,  larkspurs,  and  the 
late  sweet-peas  a  screen  of  stained-glass  tints 
against  the  sky.  Where  the  pig-styes  had  been  was 
a  little  thatched  summer-house  with  rustic  seat  and 
table.  The  bee-hives  were  just  outside  the  hedge,  at 
an  angle  of  the  meadow.  Mr.  Haseltine  continued 
to  talk  while  Mrs.  Baldwin  and  the  maid  came  in 
and  out,  carrying  tea  and  eggs  and  covered  dishes. 

"I  hope  you  don't  mind  high  tea,"  she  said.  "It 
seems  to  go  with  our  life  here." 

He  felt  that  high  tea  was  his  favourite  meal. 
There  was  a  big  white  earthenware  bowl  on  the 
table,  filled  with  sweet-peas.  "  Where  do  you  get  the 
old-fashioned  colours?"  he  asked  her.  "I  thought 
the  growers  had  extirpated  them;  one  sees  only  the 
long-stemmed  ones  nowadays,  with  the  tiresome 
artistic  shades." 

He  pleased  her  again,  he  felt  sure,  and  she  told 

[288] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

him  that  she  always  saved  the  seed,  liking  the  old 
bright  colours  better,  too. 

He  was  glad  that  he  had  come,  although  Mr. 
Haseltine's  beard  was  too  long  and  he  feared  that 
he  would  prove  talkative  in  the  worst  way,  the 
deliberate  and  retaining  way.  He  liked  the  smell 
of  everything,  —  a  mingling  of  sweet-peas,  rush- 
matting,  and  China  tea,  —  and  the  look  of  every 
thing;  good,  unpretentious  old  oak  furniture,  fresh, 
if  faded,  chintzes,  and  book-lined  walls;  and  he 
presently  liked  the  taste  of  everything  too. 

"I  feel  already  as  if  I  should  sleep  to-night,"  he 
said  to  Mrs.  Baldwin. 

She  sat  behind  the  tea-urn  a  little  distracted,  if 
anything  so  mild  could  be  called  distraction,  by 
the  plunging  movements  of  the  little  maid  as  she 
moved  about  the  table.  "That  will  do  nicely, 
Cathy,"  she  said.  "We  can  manage  now.  You 
can  bring  in  some  more  hot  water  if  I  ring.  —  Oh, 
I  do  hope  you'll  sleep.  People  usually  sleep  here." 

She  was  hardly  middle-aged,  though,  after 
Dorothy's  bright  browns  and  pinks,  Tommy  might 
well  have  thought  her  so.  Many  years  older  than 
Dorothy,  of  course,  yet  how  many  he  could  not  in 
the  least  compute.  There  was  an  agelessness,  with 
something  tough  and  solid,  about  her;  she  was  as 
little  slender  as  she  was  stout;  she  might,  with  her 
neutral  tints,  —  hair,  skin,  dress,  —  have  looked 
almost  the  same  at  sixty  as  she  did  now.  She 
was  n't  pale,  or  sallow,  or  sunburned;  yet  her  com 
plexion  seemed  so  to  go  with  her  hair  that  the  whole 
head  might  have  been  carved  in  some  pleasantly 
tinted  stone.  Only  her  eyes  gave  any  depth  of  dif 
ference;  gentle  eyes,  like  a  grey-blue  breadth  of 
evening.  She  had  a  broad,  short  face  and  broad, 

[289] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

beautifully  drawn  lips,  and  looked  almost  mysteri 
ously  innocent. 

Guy  took  her  in  to  this  extent,  swift  as  he  was  at 
taking  people  in,  and  sensitive  as  he  was  to  what 
he  found.  He  felt  sure  —  and  the  depth  of  comfort 
it  gave  him  made  him  aware  of  all  the  reluctances 
Dorothy's  decision  had  overborne  —  that  she 
had  n't  the  ghost  of  a  method  or  of  a  theory.  Shell- 
shock  people  had  merely  happened  to  come  and  had 
happened  to  get  well  quickly.  He  even  gathered,  as 
the  peaceful  evening  wore  on,  —  Cathy  clearing, 
placid  lamps  lighted,  the  windows  still  left  open 
to  the  twilight,  —  that  she  did  n't  really  think  very 
much  about  her  cases,  in  so  far  as  they  were  cases 
and  not  guests.  Having  done  her  best  in  the  way  of 
blankets,  hot  water,  and  spirit-kettles,  and  seen 
them  settled  down  into  the  life  she  had  made  for 
herself,  —  and  not  at  all  for  them,  —  she  went  her 
own  way,  irresponsible  and  unpreoccupied. 

To-night  she  did  n't  attempt  to  entertain  him. 
It  was  Mr.  Haseltine,  at  supper,  who  kept  up  the 
conversation,  and  with  the  air  of  always  keeping  it 
up,  with  even  the  air,  Guy  imagined  once  or  twice, 
of  feeling  it  specially  his  part  to  make  amends,  in 
that  sort  of  resource,  for  his  dear  daughter's  de 
ficiency.  She  was,  Guy  saw,  very  much  his  dear 
daughter;  but  he  felt  sure  that  it  had  never  entered 
the  old  gentleman's  head  that  any  one  would  find 
her  interesting  when  he  himself  was  there. 

After  supper  she  was  occupied  for  a  little  while  at 
her  desk,  adding  up  figures,  it  appeared,  in  house- 
books;  for  she  came  to  her  father  and  asked  him  if 
he  would  do  a  column  for  her.  "It  has  come  out 
differently  three  times  with  me,"  she  confessed,  but 
without  ruefulness.  "  I  'm  so  dull  at  my  accounts ! " 

[  290  ] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

Guy,  as  Mr.  Haseltine  fumbled  for  his  large  tor 
toise-shell  eyeglasses,  offered  to  help  her,  and  then 
came  over  and  sat  beside  the  desk  and  did  the  rest 
of  the  sums  for  her.  She  was  tidying  up  for  the 
month,  she  told  him,  and  always  found  it  rather 
confusing.  "It's  having  to  put  the  pennies,  which 
are  twelves,  into  pounds,  which  are  twenties,  is  n't 
it?"  she  said,  and  thanked  him  so  much. 

But  this  could  hardly  be  called  entertaining  him, 
nor  could  it,  when  he  accompanied  her  across  the 
lane  in  the  now  deepening  dusk,  to  shut  up  her 
fowls.  After  that,  there  was  the  game  of  chess, 
during  which  Mrs.  Baldwin  absented  herself  a  good 
deal,  helping  Cathy,  Guy  imagined,  with  the  beds 
and  hot-water  bottles;  and  at  nine-thirty  they  all 
lighted  their  candles  and  went  upstairs. 

Bedtime  had  been,  for  many  months,  his  most 
dreaded  moment.  The  door  shut  him  in  and  shut 
away  the  last  chance  of  alleviation.  There  was 
nothing  for  it  but  to  stretch  himself  haggardly  on  his 
couch  and  cling  to  every  detail  in  the  clay's  events, 
or  in  the  morrow's  prospects,  that  might  preserve 
him  from  the  past.  To  fight  not  to  remember  was  a 
losing  game,  and  filled  one's  brain  with  the  white 
flame  of  insomnia.  He  had  found  that  it  was  when, 
exhausted  by  the  fruitless  effort,  he  suffered  the 
waiting  vultures  to  settle  upon  him,  abandoned 
himself  to  the  beaks  and  talons,  that,  through  the 
sheer  passivity  of  anguish,  oblivion  most  often 
came. 

To-night,  from  the  habit  of  it,  his  mind  braced 
itself  as  he  came  into  the  room,  and  he  was  aware, 
as  he  had  been  for  nearly  a  year  now,  that  Ronnie's 
face  was  waiting,  as  it  were,  on  the  outskirts  of 
consciousness,  to  seize  upon  him.  But,  after  he  had 

[  291  ] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

lighted  the  candles  on  his  dressing-table  and  the 
candles  on  the  mantelpiece,  taken  off  his  coat,  and 
started  undressing,  he  found  that  his  thoughts, 
quite  effortlessly,  were  engaged  with  his  new  sur 
roundings,  old  Mr.  Haseltine's  beard  and  eyeglasses 
occupying  them,  and  the  clucking  noise  he  made  in 
drinking  the  glass  of  hot  ginger  and  water  that  had 
been  brought  to  them  on  a  tray  while  they  played; 
Mrs.  Baldwin's  accounts,  her  fowls,  and  the  colour 
of  her  eyes.  He  decided  that  the  colour  was 
Wedgwood,  or  perhaps  periwinkle  blue  —  some 
very  dense,  quiet  colour. 

As  he  moved  about  the  room,  this  protective 
interest  came  to  him  from  the  little  objects  he  made 
acquaintance  with:  the  round  Venetian  box,  dim 
gilt  and  blue  and  red,  on  the  chest  of  drawers  in 
which  he  found  a  handful  of  tiny  shells  —  shells,  no 
doubt,  that  Mrs.  Baldwin  had  picked  up  during  a 
seaside  outing;  the  faded  old  blue  leather  blotter  on 
the  writing-table,  marked  E.  H.,  which  had  prob 
ably  been  hers  since  maiden  days  (  and  did  E  stand 
for  Ethel  or  Edith  or  Ellen?);  the  pretty  lettering 
in  fine  black  script  of  the  writing-paper  so  pleas 
antly  stacked;  the  dear  old  Dutch  coffee-pot  and 
jug  on  the  mantelpiece,  and  the  bowl  of  mignonette 
that  she,  of  course,  had  arranged.  He  sank  his  face 
into  its  fragrance,  and  peace  seemed  breathed  upon 
him  from  the  flowers. 

He  was  wondering,  as  he  got  into  bed,  with  a 
glance,  before  he  blew  out  the  candle,  at  the  birds 
and  branches,  the  whites  and  blacks  and  roses  of 
the  voile-de-Genes,  whether  he  would  find  the  au 
tumn  crocuses  open  in  the  meadows  next  morning; 
it  had  looked  like  the  evening  of  another  fine  day. 
Then,  the  candle  out,  his  thoughts,  for  a  little 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

while,  were  tangled  in  the  magical  dreamland  of 
the  voile-de-Genes,  and  the  breath  of  the  mignonette 
seemed  to  lie  upon  his  eyelids  with  a  soft  compul 
sion  to  peace,  until,  all  thought  sliding  suddenly 
away,  he  dropped  into  delicious  slumber. 


HE  found  the  crocuses  open,  before  breakfast. 
Only  Cathy  was  in  the  living-room,  sweeping, 
when  he  crossed  it,  though  he  thought  he  heard 
Mrs.  Baldwin  in  the  kitchen.  A  robin  was  singing  on 
a  spray  over  the  summer-house.  The  sky  arched 
pale  and  high;  and  though  there  was  no  mist  in  the 
air,  its  softness  made  him  think  of  milk. 

From  the  garden  he  passed  into  the  meadows, 
and,  almost  at  once,  saw,  everywhere,  the  fragile, 
purple  flowers  about  him,  if  purple  were  not  too 
rich  a  word  for  their  clear,  cold  tint.  Lower  down, 
near  the  stream,  they  made  him  think  of  the  silver 
bobbins  set  playing  by  great  rain  drops  when  they 
fall  heavily  upon  wide,  shallow  pools  of  water;  and 
they  seemed  to  grow  even  more  thickly  in  the 
farther  meadow  beyond  the  wooden  bridge.  A 
sense  of  bliss  was  upon  him  as  he  walked  among 
the  flowers.  He  had  never  seen  anything  more 
lovely,  and  all  but  the  darker  buds  were  open,  show 
ing  pale  golden  hearts  to  the  sun. 

Yet,  by  the  time  that  he  had  crossed  the  bridge, 
leaning  on  the  high  rail  to  look  down  into  the  limpid, 
sliding  water,  he  knew  that  it  could  never  stay  at 
that  or  mean  that  for  him.  He  had  seen  fields  of 
flowers  in  France,  and,  while  the  horrors  there 
had  been  enacted,  these  fields  of  crocuses,  year  after 
year,  had  bloomed.  What  they  meant  for  his  mind 

[  293  ] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

was  the  imbridged  chasm  between  nature  and  the 
sufferings  of  man.  Only  when  one  ceased  to  be  a 
man,  ceased  to  remember  and  to  think,  could  such 
a  day,  such  sights,  bring  the  unreasoning  joy. 

Walking  back,  he  saw,  as  he  approached  the 
house,  that  Mrs.  Baldwin  was  standing  at  the 
garden-gate,  and,  bare-iieadfe,  in  the  linen  dress 
of  pale  lavender,  she  made  0m  at  once  think  of 
the  crocuses,  or  they  of  her.  Their  gentleness  was 
like  her,  their  simplicity,  and  something,  too,  — 
for  he  felt  this  in  her,  —  of  unearthliness.  More 
perhaps,  than  any  other  flower  they  seemed  to 
belong  to  the  air  rather  than  to  the  ground,  and, 
with  their  faint,  pale  stalks,  their  fragile  petals 
unconfmed  by  leaf  or  calyx,  to  be  rising  like 
emanations  from  the  sod  and  ready  to  dissolve  in 
mist  into  the  sunlight. 

"You  Ve  had  a  little  walk?"  Mrs.  Baldwin  asked 
him  as  they  met. 

He  said  he  had  been  looking  at  the  crocuses. 
"Are  they  really  crocuses?"  he  questioned.  "I've 
never  seen  them  wild  before." 

"They're  not  real  crocuses,"  she  said,  "though 
those  grow  wild,  too,  in  a  few  places  in  Eng 
land.  These  flowers  are  always  called  autumn  cro 
cuses  hereabouts;  but  they  are  really,  botanically, 
meadow  saffron;  and  they  grow  wild  in  a  great 
many  places.  You  see  they  are  not  so  dark  a  purple 
as  the  wild  crocus,  and  they  are  much  taller,[and 
the  petals  are  more  pointed.  Much  more  beau 
tiful  flowers,  I  think." 

"Meadow  saffron.  That's  a  pretty  name,  too. 
But  I  think  I  '11  go  on  calling  them  autumn  crocuses. 
They  were  one  of  the  reasons  that  made  me  want 
to  come  here,"  he  told  her. 

[  294  ] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

They  were  leaning  on  the  little  garden-gate  look 
ing  over  the  meadows. 

"Really?   Did  you  hear  about  them?" 

He  told  her  what  Dorothy  had  said,  passed  on 
from  the  appreciative  Tommy,  and  she  said  again, 
"Really!"  and  with  surprise,  so  that,  laughing  a 
little,  he  said  that  he  believed  she  would  never  have 
thought  of  Mr.  Barnet  alian  appreciator  of  crocuses. 
She  laughed  a  little,  too,  confessing  to  a  community 
of  perception  where  Tommy  was  concerned,  and 
remarked  that  it  was  very  nice  of  him  to  have  cared. 
"What  he  talked  about,"  she  said,  uwas  the  food. 
He  was  never  done  praising  my  coffee.  It's  time 
for  coffee  now,"  she  added. 

Guy,  as  they  went  in,  said  that,  after  all,  if  that 
was  what  Tommy  talked  about,  he  wondered  that 
his  caring  for  the  crocuses  should  have  surprised 
her,  for  he  was  sure  that  the  one  was  almost  as 
poetical  as  the  others.  It  was  poetical,  indeed,  as 
she  made  it,  in  a  delightful  and  complicated  appa 
ratus,  glass  and  brass  and  premonitory  scented 
steam;  and  the  milk  was  as  hot  as  the  water  had 
been,  and  there  was  cream.  "How  do  you  manage 
it,  in  these  days?"  he  asked.  But  she  said  that  it 
was  n't  wickedness  and  bribery,  really:  she  and 
Cathy  skimmed  it  from  the  milk  that  was  brought 
from  the  nearest  farm. 

He  realized  that  he  was  himself  talking  about 
the  food  just  as  Tommy  had  done;  just  as  the  chat 
tering  women  at  Aunt  Emily's  tea-party  had  done; 
just  as  everybody,  of  course,  had  been  doing  in 
England  ever  since  food  became  such  an  important 
matter.  But  it  was  Mrs.  Baldwin  who  made  him 
do  it;  for  though  unearthly,  she  was  deliciously  pro 
saic.  He  felt  that  anew  when  he  heard  her  going 

[  295] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

about  the  house  in  her  low-heeled  little  shoes,  with 
Cathy.  They  did,  evidently,  all  the  work,  and  how 
fresh,  composed,  and  shining  everything  was. 
The  living-room,  with  its  happy  southern  windows, 
its  tempting  writing-tables,  its  flowers  and  books, 
was  an  embodiment  of  the  poetry  that  only  such 
prose  can  secure. 

Guy,  while  Mr.  Haselthfe  sat  behind  his  rustling 
Times,  strolled  before  the  shelves,  surprised,  pres 
ently,  at  their  range  of  subject.  Surely  not  Mrs. 
Baldwin's,  such  reading;  hardly,  he  thought,  Mr. 
Haseltine's.  He  took  down  a  volume  of  Plotinus 
and  found,  on  the  fly-leaf,  "Oliver  Baldwin," 
written  in  a  small,  scholarly  hand.  That  explained 
it,  then.  Her  husband's.  The  Charles  d'Orleans, 
too,  the  Fustel  de  Coulanges,  the  Croce,  and  the 
Dante,  with  marginal  notes.  He  had  been  a  man 
of  letters,  perhaps.  Of  the  dozen  books  he  took  down 
to  examine,  only  one  was  initialled  "E.  H.,"  and 
that,  suitably,  was  Dominique.  But  it  had  been 
given  her  by  "O.  B." 

As  in  the  garden,  presently,  he  and  the  old  gen 
tleman  walked  up  and  down,  smoking,  Guy  asked 
him,  with  the  diffidence  natural  to  the  question, 
whether  his  son-in-law,  Mrs.  Baldwin's  husband, 
had  been  killed  in  the  war;  though  he  could  n't 
imagine  her  a  war-widow.  One  did  n't  indeed  think 
of  her  in  connection  with  marrying  and  giving  in 
marriage  —  that  was  part  of  the  unearthliness;  yet 
widowhood,  permanent  widowhood,  seemed  a  suit 
able  state.  She  was  not  girlish,  nor  was  she  wifely. 
She  was  widowed,  and  it  had  happened,  he  felt 
sure,  in  spite  of  his  question,  long  ago. 

As  he  had  expected,  his  companion  replied,  "Ah, 
no;  he  died  eight,  nine  years  since."  And  Mr. 
[296] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

Haseltine  then  went  on  to  tell,  taking  the  war  as 
the  obvious  interest,  and  not  without  the  satisfac 
tion  that  Guy  had  so  often  met  and  so  often  loathed, 
that  he  had  lost  dear  ones.  "  Children  of  my  eldest 
son.  Fine  lads.  Brave  boys.  One  in  the  first 
month  —  at  the  Marne;  the  other  only  last  year, 
flying.  Yes ;  I  Ve  done  my  bit,"  said  Mr.  Haseltine, 
with  the  fatuity  that- he  was  so  plentifully  com 
panioned  in  displaying. 

"Bit."  Odious  word.  His  "bit."  Why  his? 
Had  any  one  written  a  poem  on  the  formula  com 
ing  from  the  lips  of  those  for  whom  others  had 
died?  A  scattered,  flagellating  line  or  two  floated 
through  Guy's  mind.  Something  about  barbed 
wire  came  in.  He  wondered  how  old  Mr.  Haseltine 
would  have  felt  about  his  "bit,"  hung  up  on  that 
and  unable  to  die.  He  wondered  where  the  fine 
lads  now  lay.  No  more  coffee  for  them,  with  cream 
in  it;  no  more  robins  singing;  no  more  strolling 
smokes  among  mignonette  in  the  sunlight.  How 
they  were  forgotten,  already,  except  for  trophies, 
for  self-glorification  to  display!  How  pleased,  how 
smug  this  rescued,  comfortable  world!  Something 
of  his  distaste  attached  itself  even  to  Mrs.  Bald 
win  when  she  next  appeared.  Something  irritating 
him  in  her  peacefulness.  She,  too,  had  seen  nothing 
and  lost  nothing.  But,  at  all  events,  she  would  n't, 
he  knew  that,  take  any  stand  on  the  two  nephews  to 
claim  her  "bit."  There  was  nothing  fatuous  about 
Mrs.  Baldwin.  The  slight  distaste  still  lingered, 
however,  and  he  found  himself  wondering  once  or 
twice,  during  the  day  that  passed,  in  spite  of  it, 
so  pleasantly,  whether  she  was  n't,  for  all  his  ideal 
izing  similes,  a  stupid  as  well  as  a  sweet  woman. 
It  was  not  because  of  filial  self-effacement  that  she 

[  297] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

let  her  father  do  all  the  talking  at  meals:  it  was 
simply  because  she  had  nothing  to  say,  and  the 
good  old  boy  was  quite  right  in  taking  his  responsi 
bility  for  granted.  The  person  who  could  talk  was 
the  responsible  person.  Her  mind,  though  so  occu 
pied,  was  quite  singularly  inactive  and,  he  was  sure, 
completely  uncritical.  She  did  n't  find  her  father 
in  the  least  a  bore,  or  suspect  that  anybody  else 
might  find  him  so.  She  rffd  find,  Guy  felt  sure, 
satisfaction  in  all  her  occupations.  He  heard  her 
laughing  —  a  quiet  little  laugh  —  with  Cathy  in 
the  kitchen;  and  in  the  afternoon,  when  he  helped 
her  to  prick  out  seedlings,  her  attentive  profile  — 
as,  after  he  had  dug  each  hole,  she  dropped  in  the 
little  plant,  pressed  the  earth  about  its  roots,  and 
fixed  it  in  its  place  —  made  him  think  of  the  profile 
of  a  child  putting  its  dolls  to  bed.  They  planted 
three  beautiful  long  rows,  and  Guy  was  quite  tired 
by  tea-time,  for  though  they  had  high  tea  at  half- 
past  six,  they  were  not  deprived  of  the  precious 
afternoon  pause,  taking  place  as  it  did  at  the  unac 
customed  but  pleasing  hour  of  four. 

After  tea  she  went  to  see  some  people  in  the  vil 
lage,  Mr.  Haseltine  dozed  in  his  chair,  and  Guy  took 
a  long  walk. 

So  the  days  went  on,  and  at  the  end  of  a  week 
he  was  able  to  write  to  Dorothy  and  tell  her  that  he 
was  sleeping  wonderfully  and  that  Mrs.  Baldwin's 
cottage  was  all  that  she  had  pictured  it.  By  the 
end  of  the  week  he  had  even  grown  rather  attached 
to  Mr.  Haseltine,  and  he  enjoyed  playing  chess 
with  him  every  evening;  and  sometimes  they  had 
a  game  in  the  afternoon  when  tea  was  over.  The 
undercurrent  of  irritation  still  flowed,  but  he  had 
learned  to  put  up  with  the  old  gentleman  and  to 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

circumvent  his  communicativeness,  and  in  the  case 
of  Mrs.  Baldwin  he  more  and  more  felt  that  she  was 
the  sort  of  person  to  whom  one  would,  probably, 
forgive  anything.  It  had  become  evident  to  him 
that  what  might  be  dulness  might  also  be  unaware- 
ness.  That  was  a  certain  kind  of  dulness,  it  was 
true,  but  it  did  n't  preclude  capacity  for  response  if 
the  proper  stimulus  were  applied.  It  amused  him 
to  note  that  if  none  of  the  nearly  inevitable  jars  of 
shared  life  seemed  ever  to  occur  between  her  and 
her  father,  it  was  simply  because,  when  a  differ 
ence  arose,  she  remained  unconscious  of  it  unless 
it  were  put  before  her.  Nothing  could  have  been  less 
in  the  line  of  selfishness;  it  was  she  who  thought  of 
him,  of  his  comfort  and  happiness,  and  who  or 
dered  her  life  to  further  them;  he,  in  this  respect, 
was  passive;  but  Guy  felt  that  the  poor  old  boy 
often  brooded  in  some  disconsolateness  over  small 
trials  and  perplexities  that  a  companion  more  alert 
to  symptoms  would  have  discerned  and  dispelled 
at  once.  Mr.  Haseltine  even,  sometimes,  con 
fided  such  grievances  to  the  P.G. 

"I  don't  want  to  bother  Eifie  about  it,"  he  said; 
—  E.  had  stood  for  Effie  —  "she's  a  dreamy  crea 
ture  and  very  forgetful.  But  it's  quite  evident  to 
me  that  the  rector  and  his  wife  have  been  expecting 
to  be  asked  to  tea  to  meet  you.  I  've  just  been  talk 
ing  to  them  in  the  lane,  and  I  saw  it  plainly.  They 
had  asked  us  to  bring  you  before  you  arrived, 
hearing  we  were  to  have  another  guest,  —  they've 
always  been  most  kind  and  neighbourly  in  helping 
us  to  entertain  our  new  friends,  —  and  I  really 
don't  know  why  Effie  should  have  got  out  of  it.  I 
usually  have  to  remind  her,  it's  true.  But  I  some 
times  get  tired  of  always  having  to.  She  does  n't 

[  299  1 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

care  for  them  herself;  but  that's  no  reason  why 
you  might  not.  We  have  few  enough  interests  to 
offer  visitors." 

Guy  was  glad  to  have  escaped  the  rectory  tea, 
though  he  did  not  say  this  in  assuring  Mr.  Haseltine 
that  the  entertainment  offered  at  Thatches  was 
absolutely  to  his  taste.  He  was  completely  out  of 
place  at  any  rectory;  he  could  imagine  no  rector 
who  would  not  find  his  poems  pernicious;  but  he 
felt  that  there  was  justice  in  Mr.  Haseltine's  con 
tention.  He  might  have  cared  for  them.  As  it  was, 
Mr.  Haseltine  was  brought  once  again  to  remind 
ing  her.  It  was  evident  then  that  she  was  ready  to 
please  anybody  or  everybody. 

"Ask  them?  Ought  I  to  ask  them?" 

"My  dear,  it's  ten  days  since  they  sent  their 
invitation.  They  spoke  again  —  and  it 's  the  second 
time  —  of  having  been  so  sorry  not  to  see  us,  when 
I  met  them  yesterday,  in  the  lane.  I  don't  know 
why  you  did  not  go." 

"I  thought  it  would  bore  Mr.  Norris,  father.  He 
came  here  for  quiet,  you  know.  But  would  it  bore 
you?"  she  asked  Guy.  \  "They  are  very  nice.  I 
don't  mean  that." 

"It's  certainly  very  pleasant  being  quiet,"  said 
Guy;  "but  if  Mr.  Haseltine  likes  having  them,  I 
assure  you  that  people  don't  frighten  me  in  the 
least." 

"Oh,  not  on  my  account,"  Mr.  Haseltine  pro 
tested.  "I  see  our  good  friends  continually.  It  is 
of  them  I  am  thinking,  as  well  as  of  Mr.  Norris.  He 
might  find  them  more  interesting  than  you  do, 
Effie,  and  they  will,  I  fear,  be  hurt." 

Now  that  it  was  put  before  her,  Mrs.  Baldwin 
did  it  every  justice,  rising  from  the  breakfast-table, 

[300] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

where  she  had  just  finished,  to  go  to  her  desk,  and 
murmuring  as  she  went,  "  I  had  n't  thought  of  that. 
They  might  be  hurt.  So,  if  it  won't  bore  you,  Mr. 
Norris." 

And  the  Laycocks  were  asked,  and  did  indeed 
bore  Guy  sadly. 

It  was  on  the  night  after  their  visit  —  Mr.  Lay- 
cock  had  questioned  him  earnestly  about  his  per 
sonal  impressions  of  the  war  and  to  evade  him  had 
been  wearying  —  that  Guy,  for  the  first  time,  really, 
since  he  had  come,  found  sleep  difficult  and  even 
menaced.  It  was  because  of  that,  he  felt  sure, 
looking  back  on  it,  that  the  curious  occurrence  of 
the  next  day  took  place  —  curious,  and,  had  it 
taken  place  in  the  presence  of  any  one  else,  embar 
rassing.  But  what  made  it  most  curious  was  just 
that;  he  had  not  felt  it  embarrassing  to  break  down 
and  sob  before  Mrs.  Baldwin. 

The  morning  had  begun  badly.  The  breakfast- 
table  papers  had  been  full  of  the  approaching  vic 
tory.  Mr.  Haseltine  read  out  passages  from  the 
Times  as  he  broke  his  toast  and  drank  his  coffee. 
He  had  reiterated  the  triumph  of  his  long  convic 
tion,  and  Mrs.  Baldwin  had  murmured  assent. 
"All's  well  with  the  world,"  was  the  suffocating 
assurance  that  seemed  to  breathe  from  them  both. 
;< All's  blue."  Was  hell  forgotten  like  that?  What 
if  the  war  were  won  ?  Of  course,  it  had  to  be  won  — 
that  was  an  unquestioned  premise  that  had  under 
lain  his  rebellions  as  well  as  Mr.  Haseltine's  com 
placencies  since  the  beginning.  But  what  of  it? 
No  victory  could  redeem  what  had  been  done. 

He  went  out  into  the  garden,  to  be  away  from. 
Mr.  Haseltine,  as  soon  as  he  could,  and  took  a  book 
into  the  summer-house;  and  it  was  here,  a  little 

1 301  ] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

later,  that  Mrs.  Baldwin,  seeing  him  as  she  passed, 
her  garden-basket  on  her  arm,  paused  to  ask  him, 
with  her  smile  of  the  shy  hostess,  if  he  were  all  right. 
She  did  n't  often  ask  him  that,  and  he  saw  at  once 
that  his  recent  recalcitrancy  to  rejoicing  had  pierced 
even  her  vagueness.  He  knew  that  he  still  looked 
recalcitrant,  and  he  was  determined  not  to  soften 
the  overt  opposition  rising  in  him;  so  he  raised 
his  eyes  to  her  over  his  book  and  said  that  he  was 
not,  perhaps,  feeling  very  fit  that  morning. 

Mrs.  Baldwin  hesitated  at  the  entrance  to  the 
summer-house.  She  looked  behind  her  at  the  gar 
den  and  up  at  the  roses  clustering  over  the  lintel 
under  the  thatch;  she  even  took  out  her  scissors, 
in  the  uncertainty  that,  evidently,  beset  her,  and 
snipped  off  a  dead  rose,  and  she  said  presently, 
"It  was  all  that  talk  about  the  war,  was  n't  it  — 
when  what  you  must  ask  is  to  forget  it." 

"Oh,  I  don't  ask  that  at  all,"  said  Guy.  "I 
should  scorn  myself  for  forgetting  it."  She  glanced 
in  again  at  him,  mildly.  "I  want  to  forget  what's 
irrelevant,  like  victory,"  he  said;  "but  not  what 
is  relevant,  like  irremediable  wrong." 

Her  awareness  had  not,  of  course,  gone  nearly  as 
far  as  this.  She  kept  her  eyes  on  him,  and  he  was 
glad  to  feel  that  he  could  probably  shock  her. 
"You  see,"  he  found  himself  saying,  "I  saw  the 
wrong.  I  saw  the  war  —  at  the  closest  quarters." 

"Yes  —  oh,  yes,"  Mrs.  Baldwin  murmured. 

"For  me,  tragedy  does  n't  cease  to  exist  when 
it's  shovelled  underground.  If  one  goes  down  into 
hell,  one  does  n't  want  to  forget  the  fact  —  though 
one  may  hope  to  forget  the  torments  and  horrors; 
one  wants,  rather,  to  remember  that  hell  exists  — 
and  to  try  and  square  life  with  that  actuality." 

1 302] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

There  was  silence  after  this  for  a  moment,  and 
he  imagined  that  she  was  very  much  at  a  loss.  Her 
next  words  seemed  indeed  to  express  nothing  so 
much  as  her  failure  to  follow  —  that  and  a  silliness 
really  rather  adorable,  had  he  been  in  a  mood  to 
find  it  anything  but  exasperating.  "But,  still  — 
hell  does  n't  exist,  does  it?"  she  offered  him  for  his 
appeasement. 

Guy  laughed.  "Does  n't  it?  When  things  like 
this  war  can  happen  ?  How  could  it  ever  have  ex 
isted  but  in  men's  hearts?  It's  there  that  it  smoul 
ders  and,  when  its  moment  comes,  leaps  out  to 
blast  the  world." 

He  could  talk  to  her  like  this  because  she  was 
too  simple  to  suspect  in  him  a  poetical  attitudiniz 
ing;  any  one  else  would  of  course  suspect  it.  Guy 
was  even  aware  that  to  any  one  else  that  was  what 
it  would  have  been.  She  looked  kind  and  troubled 
and  as  much  as  ever  at  a  loss.  She  did  n't  know  at 
all  how  to  deal  with  the  patient,  and  she  was  evi 
dently  uncertain  what  to  do,  since  it  might  seem 
heartless  to  go  away  and  leave  him  to  his  black 
thoughts,  yet  intrudingly  intimate  to  come  and  sit 
down  beside  him.  Nothing  could  be  less  intimate 
than  Mrs.  Baldwin.  It  was  he,  of  course,  who  was 
tasteless  in  talking  to  her  in  a  vein  appropriate 
only  to  intimacy. 

"Don't  bother  over  me,"  he  said,  offering  her  the 
patent  artifice  of  a  smile.  "I'm  simply  a  bad  case. 
You  must  n't  let  me  trouble  you.  You  must  just 
turn  your  back  on  me  when  I  'm  like  this." 

It  was  not  poetic  attitudinizing  now;  there  was 
in  his  voice  a  quaver  of  grief  and  she  responded 
to  it  at  once. 

"Oh,  but  I  don't  like  to  do  that.    I  do  wish  I 

[  303  ] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

could  be  of  some  help.  I  see  you  have  n't  slept,  for 
you  look  so  tired,  as  you  did  when  you  first  came. 
And  Mr.  Laycock  did  bore  you.  It's  wrong  of 
people  to  talk  to  you  about  the  war." 

For  the  first  time  he  saw  in  the  eyes  fixed  upon 
him,  pity,  evident  pity  and  solicitude.  And  before 
it  he  felt  himself  crumble  suddenly.  He  saw  all  the 
reasons  she  had  for  pitying  him,  did  she  but  know. 
He  saw  Ronnie's  face  again ;  he  saw  his  own  haunted 
night  and  his  own  grief.  He  wanted  her  to  see  it. 
"Oh  —  one  can't  be  guarded  like  that,"  he  mur 
mured;  "I  must  try  to  get  used  to  it.  But  —  I 
did  n't  sleep;  that's  true.  I'm  so  horribly  afraid  of 
not  sleeping.  You  can't  imagine  what  it  is.  I've 
the  most  awful  visions."  And  leaning  his  elbows 
on  the  table,  he  put  his  hands  before  his  face  and 
began  to  cry. 

She  stood  there;  he  did  not  hear  her  move  at 
first;  and  then  she  entered  and  sat  down  on  the 
seat  beside  him.  But  she  said  nothing  and  did 
not  touch  him.  He  had  had  in  all  the  tumult 
of  his  disintegration,  a  swift  passage  of  surmise; 
would  she  not  draw  his  head  upon  her  shoulder, 
like  a  mother,  and  comfort  him?  But  that  would 
have  broken  him  down  heaven  knew  how  much 
further. 

He  cried  frankly,  articulating  presently,  "It's 
my  nerves,  you  know;  they  have  all  gone  to  pieces. 
I  lost  my  friend;  my  dearest  friend.  For  months  I 
did  n't  sleep." 

Mrs.  Baldwin's  silence  was  not  oppressive,  or 
repressive  either.  He  heard  her  hands  move  slightly 
on  the  basket  she  held  on  her  knees  and  the  soft 
chafing  in  the  folds  of  her  linen  bodice  that  her 
breathing  made.  It  was  an  accepting  stillness  and 

[304] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

it  presently  quieted  him;  more  than  that,  it  en 
abled  him  at  last  to  lift  his  head  and  look  at  her 
without  feeling  ashamed  of  himself.  Oddly  enough, 
he  knew  that  he,  perhaps,  ought  to  be.  He  could 
have  helped  himself.  There  had  been  an  element 
of  wilfulness  in  his  breakdown;  he  had  wanted  her 
to  see;  but,  even  had  she  known  this  about  him, 
he  would  not  have  felt  ashamed.  She  was  so  curi 
ously  a  person  with  whom  one  could  not  associate 
blames  and  judgments.  She  was  an  accepting  per 
son. 

She  was  n't  looking  at  him,  but  out  at  the  sweet, 
bright,  autumnal  little  garden;  and  as  her  eyes 
came  to  him,  he  felt  them  full  of  thought;  felt,  for 
the  first  time,  sure  that,  whatever  she  might  be, 
she  was  not  dull. 

He  could  not  remember,  looking  back  at  the  little 
scene,  that  she  had  said  a  single  further  word.  He 
did  not  think  that  he  had  said  anything  further. 
He  was  helping  her,  a  little  while  after,  to  prune 
the  Aimee  Vibert  rose  that  had  grown  with  great 
unruliness  over  the  little  tool-house  near  the 
kitchen  door.  "It  will  really  pull  it  down  unless 
we  cut  out  some  of  these  great  branches,"  she  had 
said,  as,  equipped  with  stout  gloves,  they  had 
worked  away  together,  unfastening  the  tangled 
trails  and  stretching  them  out  on  the  ground.  So 
displayed,  the  Aimee  Vibert  was  drastically  dealt 
with,  and  it  was  midday  before  they  finished  fasten 
ing  the  thinned  and  shortened  shoots  into  place. 
;-  She  had  said  nothing  further;  but  he  believed 
that,  for  the  first  time,  her  thought  really  included 
him.  He  had  been  put  before  her.  She  was  differ 
ent  afterwards.  He  had  become  an  individual  to 
her,  and  had  ceased  to  be  merely  the  paying  guest. 

[305  ] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 


IV 

THE  third  week  came.  There  was  rain,  rather  sad 
September  rain,  for  a  day  or  two.  They  sat  in  the 
evenings  before  the  wide  fireplace  where  logs 
blazed.  Mrs.  Baldwin,  at  his  suggestion,  read 
aloud  to  them  Fabre's  Souvenirs  Entomologiques. 
She  read  French  prettily,  better  than  he  did  him 
self,  and  he  was  a  little  chagrined  once  or  twice  to 
find  that  she  knew  it  better,  priding  himself  on  his 
French  as  he  did.  He  had  lived  for  a  year  in  Paris, 
with  Ronnie,  before  the  war. 

The  horrors  of  the  grim,  complicated  under 
world  revealed  by  the  French  seer  distressed  him. 
Mrs.  Baldwin  did  not  feel  them  as  he  did,  feeling 
the  marvels  rather  than  the  horrors,  perhaps.  She 
laughed  a  little,  rather  callously,  at  the  ladies  who 
devoured  their  husbands,  and  seemed  pleased  by 
the  odious  forethought  of  the  egg-laying  mothers. 
She  shared  Fabre's  humorous  dispassionateness,  if 
not  the  fond  partiality  which,  while  it  made  him 
the  more  charming,  did  n't,  Guy  insisted,  make 
his  horrid  wasps  and  beetles  a  bit  more  so.  As 
usual,  she  vexed  him  a  little,  even  while,  more  and 
more,  he  felt  her  intelligent;  perhaps  she  vexed 
him  all  the  more  for  that. 

"She's  so  devilishly  contented  with  the  world," 
he  said  to  himself  sometimes,  even  while  he  smiled, 
remembering  her  laughter. 

Old  Mr.  Haseltine  fell  asleep  one  night  while  she 
read,  and  to  be  together  there  before  the  fire,  the 
old  man  sleeping  beside  them,  made  them  nearer 
than  they  had  ever  been  before.  Guy  was  aware 
of  this  nearness  while  he  listened  and  while  he 

[306] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

watched  her  hand,  short,  like  a  child's  (and  her  face 
was  so  short)  support  the  book,  and  her  eyelashes 
dropping  down  the  page  or  raised  to  a  fresh  one. 

When  he  went  to  his  room  that  night,  he  stood 
still  for  a  long  time,  his  candle  in  his  hand,  listening 
to  the  soft  beat  of  the  rain  against  the  window. 
He  was  hardly  ever  now  afraid  of  being  alone,  or 
of  the  dark,  and  he  stood  there  musing  and  listen 
ing,  while  he  still  seemed  to  see  Mrs.  Baldwin's 
hand  as  it  held  the  book,  and  her  reading  profile. 
Her  life  seemed  to  breathe  upon  him  and  he  rested 
in  it.  He  slept  deliciously. 

"Did  you  know  that  I  write?"  he  asked  her  next 
day.  He  had  wondered  about  this  once  or  twice 
before. 

"Oh,  yes;  your  cousin,  in  her  letter,  you  know, 
told  me  that  you  wrote,"  said  Mrs.  Baldwin. 

They  were  in  the  living-room  after  midday  din 
ner,  and  alone.  She  looked  up  at  him  very  kindly 
from  the  papers  and  letters  she  was  sorting  at  her 
desk. 

"You've  never  heard  of  my  effusions  otherwise, 
though  ? "  He  put  on  a  rueful  air.  "  Such  is  fame ! " 

"Are  you  famous?"  Her  smile  was  a  little 
troubled.  "I  don't  follow  things,  you  know,  living 
here  as  I  do." 

"You  read  the  papers.   I  have  had  reviews:  good 


ones." 


"  I  don't  read  them  very  regularly,"  she  admitted. 
"And  I  so  often  don't  remember  the  names  of 
people  in  reviews,  even  when  I've  liked  what  is 
said  of  them.  Have  you  any  of  your  poems  here? 
Perhaps  you'll  let  me  read  them." 

He  felt,  with  the  familiar  chagrin,  that  she  would 
fiever,  of  herself,  have  thought  of  asking  him. 

[  307] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

"Yes,  my  last  volume.   It's  just  out." 

He  was  going  for  a  walk  in  the  rain  with  Mr. 
Haseltine  that  afternoon.  There  was  an  old  church 
in  the  neighbouring  village  that  his  friend  wanted 
him  to  see.  Mrs.  Baldwin  had  letters  to  write. 
"Will  you  have  time  to  look  at  it  while  we  are 
out?"  he  asked. 

Although  she  had  shown  so  little  interest  in  him, 
he  was  eager,  pathetically  so,  he  felt,  that  she 
should  read  and  care  about  his  poems.  She  said 
that  it  was  just  the  time:  her  letters  would  not  take 
long.  And  so  he  ran  up  to  his  room  and  got  the 
little  book  for  her:  Burnt  Offerings. 

All  the  time  that  he  was  walking  with  Mr. 
Haseltine  and  seeing  the  church,  and  the  old  manor 
house  that  took  them  a  half  mile  further,  he  won 
dered  what  she  was  thinking  about  his  poems. 

By  the  time  they  had  returned  the  rain  had 
ceased.  A  warm  September  sunlight  diffused  itself. 
Veils  lifted  from  the  stream  and  trailed  upon  the 
lower  meadows.  The  sky  grew  clear  and  the  leaves 
all  sparkled.  They  found  that  Mrs.  Baldwin  had 
had  her  cup  of  tea,  for  it  was  past  four;  but  all  had 
been  left  in  readiness  for  them,  the  kettle  boiling; 
and  after  Guy  had  swallowed  his,  he  went  out  and 
saw  her  walking  down  among  the  crocuses. 

"Oh,  you  are  back?"  she  said  when  he  joined 
her.  "I  wanted  to  be  there  to  give  you  your  tea. 
Was  it  all  right?" 

"  Perfectly,"  he  said.  "We  put  in  just  your  num 
ber  of  spoonfuls." 

Mrs.  Baldwin  wore  her  little  knitted  jacket  and 
had  put  on  her  white,  rubber-soled  canvas  shoes 
against  the  wet;  but  her  head,  with  its  thick,  close 
braids,  was  bare  to  the  sunlight. 

[308] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

"I  had  to  come  out  as  soon  as  it  stopped  rain 
ing,"  she  said;  "and  I'm  afraid  I  simply  forgot  to 
look  out  for  you  and  father." 

Her  gentleness  had  always  seemed  contentment; 
this  afternoon  it  seemed  happiness,  and  he  had 
never  seen  her  look  so  young.  He  wondered  if  she 
were  going  to  take  him  so  dreadfully  aback  as  not 
even  to  mention  his  poems;  if  she  had  simply  for 
gotten  them,  too.  Already  her  demeanour,  un 
clouded,  almost  radiant,  inflicted  a  wound;  she  had 
either  forgotten,  or  she  had  cared  little  indeed, 
since  she  could  look  like  that.  But,  after  he  had 
commented,  consentingly,  on  the  lovely  hour,  she 
went  on  with  a  change  of  tone,  a  voice  a  little  shy, 
"I've  read  the  poems.  Thank  you  so  much  for  let 
ting  me  see  them." 

"You  read  all  of  them?" 

"Yes.   I  did  n't  write  my  letters." 

"I  hope  you  read  them,  then,  because  you  cared 
for  them." 

She  did  n't  answer  for  a  moment,  walking  along 
and  placing  the  small  white  feet  carefully  among 
the  crocuses.  "They  are  very  sad,"  she  then  said. 

He  was  aware,  after  an  instant  of  adjustment  to 
the  blow,  that  she  made  him  very  angry.  Terrible, 
his  poems,  searing,  scorching;  wicked,  if  one  would; 
but  not  sad. 

"  Oh ! "  he  murmured ;  and  he  wondered  if  the  divi 
ded  feeling  she  had  from  the  first  roused  in  him  had 
been  this  hatred,  not  perhaps  of  her,  but  of  her  un 
varying  acquiescence,  her  untroubled  inadequacy. 

"They  interested^  me  very  much,"  she  said, 
feeling,  no  doubt,  that,  whatever  he  was,  he  was 
not  pleased.  "They  made  me  see,  I  mean,  all  the 
things  you  have  been  through." 

[309] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

"S;ul  things,  you  call  them.  You  know,  I  rather 
feel  as  if  I'd  heard  you  call  hell  sad." 

She  looked  up  at  him  quickly,  and  it  was  now 
she  who  was  taken  aback  and,  as  she  had  been  the 
other  day,  at  a  loss.  And,  as  on  the  other  day,  she 
found  the  same  answer,  though  she  offered  it  depre- 
catingly,  feeling  his  displeasure.  "But  hell  does  n't 
exist," 

"Don't  you  think  anything  horrible  exists?" 

They  turned  at  the  end  of  the  meadow.  It 
seemed  to  him,  although  he  felt  as  if  he  hated  her, 
that  they  Were  suddenly  intimate  in  their  antago 
nism.  He  would  force  that  antagonism,  and  its  inti 
macy,  upon  her  —  to  its  last  implication. 

"Horrible ?  Oh,  yes,  yes ! '*  she  said,  startled,  and 
that  was,  he  reflected  grimly,  to  the  good.  "But 
it  would  have  to  be  irretrievable,  would  n't  it,  to 
be  hell?"  she  urged. 

"Do  you  suggest  that  it's  not  irretrievable? 
You  own  it's  horrible.  Irretrievably  horrible,  I  call 
it.  And  that's  what  I  call  hell.  Yet  all  that  you 
can  find  to  say  of  my  poems  is  that  they  are  sad." 

She  hesitated,  feeling  her  way,  hearing  in  the 
recurrent  word  how  it  had  rankled.  "I  meant  sad, 
I  think,  because  of  you;  because  you  had  suffered 
so  much." 

"You  seem  always  to  imply  that  one  might  not 
have  suffered!**  And  thrusting  aside  her  quickly 
murmured,  "Oh,  no,  no!"  he  went  on:  "I  can't 
understand  your  attitude  of  mind.  Do  you  realize 
at  all,  I  sometimes  wonder,  what  it  has  all  meant, 
this  nightmare  We  are  living  in  —  we,  that  is,  to 
whom  it  came?  Can  you  imagine  what  it  was  to  me 
to  see  boys,  dead  boys,  buried  stealthily,  at  night, 
under  fire?  Boys  so  mangled,  so  disfigured  — 

[310] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

read  that  poem,  'Half  a  Corpse'? -1- that  their 
mothers  would  n't  have  known  them;  featureless, 
dismembered  boys,  heaped  one  upon  the  other  in 
the  mud.  Has  your  mind  ever  dwelt  upon  the  com 
munity  of  corruption  in  which  they  lie,  as  their 
mothers'  minds  must  dwell?  I  do  not  understand 
you.  I  do  not  understand  how  you  can  dare  to  call 
such  things  sad." 

His  own  wrath  shook  and  yet  sustained  him, 
though  he  knew  a  fear  lest  he  had  gone  too  far; 
but  in  her  silence  —  they  had  reached  the  other 
end  of  the  meadow  and  turned  again  in  their  walk 
—  he  felt  that  there  was  no  resentment.  It  was  as 
if  she  realized  that  those  who  have  returned  from 
hell  cannot  be  asked  to  stop  and  pick  their  words 
with  courtesy,  and  accepted  his  vehemence,  if  not 
his  blame;  and  again,  when  she  spoke  at  last,  he 
felt  that  her  bewilderment  had  settled  into  thought. 

"Yes,  I  can  imagine,"  she  said.  "But  no,  I  don't 
think  that  my  mind  has  dwelt  on  those  things.  If  I 
were  their  mothers,  I  don't  think  that  my  mind 
would  dwell,  as  you  say.  Something  would  burn 
through.  There  are  other  kinds  of  suffering  —  bet 
ter  kinds;  they  help,  I  believe.  And,  for  that  kind, 
it  is  worse,  but  is  it  so  much  worse  than  in  ordinary 
life?  That  is  what  happens  all  the  time  when  there 
is  no  war;  dreadful  changes  in  the  dead;  and  burials. 
They  are  not  quite  so  near  each  other  in  a  church 
yard,  and  their  graves  are  named;  but  do  you  think 
that  makes  it  easier  to  bear?" 

He  felt  now  as  if  it  were  insult  she  was  offering 
him. 

"You  deny  all  tragedy  to  war,  then?  It's  all  to 
you  on  a  level  with  an  Elegy  in  a  Country  Church 
yard,  with  curfew  and  rector  and  primrose-wreaths  ? 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

You  read  f  His  Eyes/  "  —  Guy's  voice  had  a  hoarser 
note,  but,  mingled  with  the  sincerity  of  what,  at 
last,  he  knew  he  was  to  tell  her,  the  very  centre  of 
his  sick  heart,  went  a  surface  appreciation  of  what 
he  had  just  said  and  of  how  curfew  and  rector  and 
primrose-wreaths  would  go  into  a  bitter  poem  one 
day,  —  "you  read  that  poem  of  mine  at  the  end  of 
the  book.  '  His  Eyes '  is  about  myself  and  my  friend 
Ronnie  Barlow,  the  artist;  you  never  heard  of  him, 
I  know.  He  hung,  with  shattered  legs,  dying,  just 
in  front  of  us,  on  the  barbed  wire,  for  three  days 
and  nights.  When  he  could  speak,  it  was  to  beg 
to  be  shot.  We  tried  to  get  to  him,  four,  five  times ; 
it  was  no  good.  There  was  barbed  wire  between, 
and  the  Germans  spotted  us  every  time.  He  died 
during  the  third  night,  and  next  morning  I  found 
him  looking  at  me  —  as  he  had  looked  during  these 
three  days  —  his  torment  and  his  reproach.  And 
so  he  went  on  looking  until  the  rats  came  and  he 
had  no  more  eyes  to  look  with.  Will  you  tell  me 
that  that  is  no  worse  than  the  deaths  died  in  the 
parishes  of  England?  Will  you  tell  me  that  it's  the 
sort  of  death  died  by  the  cheery,  mature  gentlemen 
who  ate  their  dinners  and  slept  warm  and  dropped 
a  tear  —  while  they  did  their  'bit'  in  their  Govern 
ment  offices  —  over  the  brave  lads  saving  Eng 
land?" 

He  had  taken  refuge  from  Ronnie  in  hatred  of 
those  whom,  in  the  poem,  he  called  his  murderers, 
and  his  voice  was  weighted  with  its  fierce  indict 
ment.  In  the  pause  that  followed  he  had  time  to 
wonder  if  she  found  him,  at  last,  intolerable.  She 
walked  beside  him,  still  looking  down,  and  it  might 
well  have  been  in  a  chill  withdrawal.  He  almost 
expected  to  hear  her,  in  another  moment,  find  the 

[312  ] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

conventional  phrase  with  which  to  leave  him.  But 
no,  —  and  in  his  own  long  sigh  he  recognized  the 
depth  of  his  relief,  —  she  was  not  going  to  punish 
him  with  convention;  she  was  not  going  to  leave 
him.  And  what  she  said  at  last  was,  "  I  'm  so  sorry ! 
Please  believe  that  I'm  so  very,  very  sorry!  Only 
—  why  do  you  speak,  and  write,  as  though  it  were 
some  one's  fault?" 

Ah,  here  then,  at  last,  they  had  come  to  it,  the 
barrier,  on  one  side  of  which  he  stood  with  his  hell 
and  she  on  the  other  in  her  artificial  paradise. 

"I  write  it  and  speak  it  because  it  is  the  truth," 
he  said.  "Millions  of  innocent  creatures,  of  gifted, 
beautiful  creatures,  like  my  friend,  have  been 
slaughtered,  tortured,  driven  mad,  because  of 
greasy,  greedy  wire-pullers  in  their  leather  chairs 
at  home." 

"In  this  war,  too?" 

"In  this  war  preeminently." 

"  You  don't  feel  that  the  crime  was  Germany's  ? " 

"Oh,  of  course!"  his  laugh  sneered  the  facile  ac 
quiescence.  "Let  us  put  it  on  Germany,  by  all 
means.  We'll  sleep  the  sounder!  Certainly,  I  grant 
it  to  you  freely  —  Germany  struck  the  match  and 
lighted  the  fuse." 

"And  were  n't  we  all  responsible  for  the  fuse  — 
you  and  I,  I  mean,  as  much  as  the  people  in  the 
leather  chairs?"  There  was  no  irony  in  her  repeti 
tion.  "The  people  who  fought,  as  much  as  the 
people  who  did  n't  fight?  Was  n't  the  fuse  simply 
our  conception  of  our  national  safety?  of  our  na 
tional  honour?  That  is  what  I  feel  so  sad  about 
your  poems,  —  though  I  should  never  have  wanted 
to  explain  it,  —  that  you  are  so  wrong,  so  ungen 
erous,  so  vindictive." 

[313  ] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

In  all  his  life  it  had  rarely  been  his  lot  to  know 
such  astonishment.  Astonishment  came  first;  and 
then  the  deep,  deep  hurt  that  rose,  wave  after  wave, 
within  him.  Was  this,  then,  what  she  felt  for  him 

—  only  this  ?  Had  n't  he  told  her  about  Ronnie  — 
her  alone  of  all  the  world?    Should  not  that  have 
made  her  reverent  of  him,  and  pitiful?    Should  a 
man  who  had  endured   such  griefs  receive  such 
blows?   Waves  of  colour,  too,  flooded  his  face  and 
tears  rushed  to  his  eyes.  He  thought,  when  he  was 
able  at  last  to  gather  thoughts  together,  that  it 
should  now  be  for  him  to  find  the  conventional 
phrase  and  leave  her.    But,  glancing  again  at  her 
profile,  finding  it,  though  singularly  pale,  so  much 
more  gentle  than  severe,  the  impulse  dropped.   He 
was  not  strong  enough  for  convention.    He  was 
shaken,  shattered;  too  weak  even  for  self-preserva 
tion. 

He  walked,  miserable,  and  his  mind  full  of  a 
whirling  darkness,  beside  her,  determining  only 
that  she  should  be  the  first  to  speak  again.  She 
was.  She  had  quite  come  out  of  her  shyness,  —  if 
it  had  ever  been  that,  —  and  though  it  was  with 
something  faltering,  something  that  was,  he  made 
out,  sorry  for  them  both  in  the  predicament  to 
which,  after  all,  he,  and  not  she,  had  brought  them, 
it  was  more  than  all  with  resolution  that  she 
said,  — 

"I  am  so  sorry  if  I  seem  presumptuous.  But  you 
asked  me.  And  your  poems  are  n't  the  first  I've 
read.  So  many  young  men,  who  have  been  so 
brave,  like  you,  and  who  have  been  through  it  all 
so  that  they  have  the  right  to  speak,  seem  to  feel 
more  than  anything  that  hatred,  not  against  war, 

—  we  all  hate  war,  —  but  against  people,  some 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

groups  of  people,  they  make  responsible.  There 
are  bad  and  selfish  people  everywhere,  —  among 
poets,  I  feel  sure,  just  as  much  as  among  states 
men;  but  has  n't  this  war  proved  —  since  every 
body  has  gone  —  that  no  one  group  is  bad  and 
selfish;  that  there  are  men  in  every  group  who  have 
been  glad  to  die  for  their  country?  I  know  I  have 
no  weight  with  young  men  like  you;  I  am  not  a 
person  of  any  importance  for  opinion;  but  how  I 
wish  that  I  could  make  you  believe  that  you  ought 
not  to  write  like  that  —  with  hatred  in  your  heart. 
Can  great  poetry  be  written  out  of  hatred?  And 
it's  not  only  yourself  it  hurts:  it  hurts  other  people; 
harms  them,  I  mean.  It  spreads  a  mood  of  dark 
ness  and  fever  just  when  they  are  so  in  need  of  light 
and  calm.  And  for  the  mothers,  for  people  who 
have  lost,  cruelly,  those  whom  they  loved  as  much, 
perhaps  even  more,  than  you  loved  your  friend  — 
do  you  not  see  how  your  poems  must  sicken  them? 
Do  you  not  see  that  it  all  becomes  just  that  —  a 
community  of  corruption?  You  imprison  them, 
force  them  back  into  their  helpless  suffering;  when 
what  they  pray  for  is  strength  to  rise  above  it  and 
to  feel  all  the  goodness  and  love  that  has  been  given 
for  them;  to  feel  what  is  beautiful,  not  what  is 
horrible;  so  as  to  be  worthy  of  their  dead." 

As  he  listened  to  her,  —  and  with  a  slow  revul 
sion  of  all  his  nature,  as  if,  against  his  very  will  and 
mind,  she  moved  his  heart  to  breaking  with  some 
thing  passionate  that  spoke  in  her  words,  —  an 
overwhelming  experience  befell  him. 

The  crocuses  beneath  their  feet,  her  sunlit  shape 
beside  him,  her  voice,  as  she  spoke  to  him  thus, 
with  her  very  soul,  blended  together  in  a  rising 
wave  of  light,  or  music,  piercing,  sweeping  him, 

1 315  ] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

lifting  him  up  to  some  new  capacity,  leaving  the 
old  inert  and  dangling,  lifting  and  still  lifting  him, 
until  at  last,  as  if  with  a  great,  emerging  breath, 
he  came  into  a  region  bright  and  fair,  whence,  look 
ing  down  on  the  dark  and  tattered  past,  he  saw  all 
life  differently,  even  Ronnie's  death,  even  Ronnie's 
eyes.  Ronnie  was  with  him,  with  Mrs.  Baldwin,  in 
the  bright  stillness. 

Upborne,  sustained,  like  a  swimmer  in  some 
strange,  new  element,  he  seemed  to  gaze  down 
through  its  golden  spaces  at  the  inert,  alien  dark 
ness  that  had  been  himself.  "Rubbish!  Rubbish!" 
he  seemed  to  hear  himself  say.  Yet  all  was  not  left 
behind;  all  was  not  rubbish;  else  how  could  he  be 
here,  with  her,  with  Ronnie?  It  was  bliss  to  see 
himself  as  he  had  been,  since  something  else  was  so 
immeasurably  secure.  Oh  —  could  one  stay  al 
ways  like  this!  This  was  to  taste  of  everlasting  life. 
His  longing,  as  if  with  a  cry,  a  grasp  from  the  swim 
mer,  marked  the  soft  turning  of  the  tide.  He  sank, 
but  it  was  sweetly,  if  with  a  strange,  an  infinite 
sadness,  a  sadness  recorded,  accepted,  while  he 
sank,  as  making  forever  the  portion  of  the  temporal 
consciousness.  And  the  bliss  still  stayed  in  the 
acceptance,  and  purple  ripples  seemed  to  glide  back 
rhythmically  as  the  crocuses  swam  before  his  eyes. 
It  had  all  been  only  an  instant  then,  for  her  last 
words  came  to  him  as  if  she  had  but  spoken  them 
and  he  heard  his  own  voice  murmuring,  as  if  from 
very  far  away,  "Perhaps  you  are  right." 

The  ripples  stayed  themselves.  He  looked  down 
at  the  crocuses  and  saw  Mrs.  Baldwin's  white  shoes 
standing  still  among  them.  Lifting  his  eyes,  which 
felt  heavy,  he  found  her  looking  at  him  with  atten 
tion,  with  anxiety. 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

"It's  nothing,"  he  tried  to  smile.  "Nothing  at 
all.  I  mean  —  you  Ve  done  me  good."  He  saw  that 
she  had  n't  an  idea  of  how  she  had  done  it. 

"Do  take  my  arm,"  she  said.  "I  ought  to  have 
remembered  that  you  are  not  strong  yet." 

He  took  her  arm.  Perhaps  he  needed  it.  His  nor 
mal  consciousness  was  gathering  about  him  once 
again,  but  no  longer  with  the  old  close  texture.  It 
was  all  more  permeable  to  light  —  that  was  how 
he  tried  to  put  it.  And  he  heard  his  voice  go  on, 
"You  see  —  what  it  all  amounts  to  —  oh,  I 'm  not 
thinking  about  the  poems,  I  know  that  you  must 
be  right  —  it's  not  what  you  say,  is  it?  It's  some 
thing  far  more  right  than  what  you  say.  But  I  love 
you.  That's  why  you  can  do  it  to  me.  I  wonder  I 
did  n't  see  it  before.  You  made  me  angry  with 
your  peacefulness.  I  did  n't  understand.  I  needed 
your  peace.  You,  you  were  what  I  needed.  You 
will  forgive  my  speaking?  Surely  you'll  under 
stand.  Perhaps  you  feel  you  hardly  know  me, 
while  you  are  like  my  life.  Is  it  possible  that 
some  day  you  might  love  me  back  and  marry 
me?" 

He  had  used  the  words  that  came.  They  were 
the  words  of  the  normal  consciousness.  How  else 
could  he  ask  her  to  keep  him  always  near  her  so 
that  he  might  never  lose  that  sense  of  paradise? 

But  she  had  stopped  still  and  had  drawn  her 
arm  from  his.  Was  it  possible  that  after  what  she 
had  done  to  him,  for  him,  she  could  see  him  only 
thus?  "Oh,  no,"  she  said.  "No.  ^No."  Never  had 
he  seen  a  human  face  express  with  such  ineffable 
gentleness  such  repudiation.  And  she  repeated  it, 
as  if  he  had  given  her  too  much  to  bear;  as  if  for 
her  own  reassurance;  as  if  to  efface  even  the  mem- 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

ory  of  his  words:  "No;  no;  no!"  She  began  again 
to  walk  towards  the  house. 

Had  it  not  been  for  the  initiation  that  had  passed 
he  knew  so  clearly  now,  in  all  unawareness  from 
her  spirit  to  his,  he  would  have  felt  to  the  full  the 
shame  of  his  rejection,  the  deserved  shame.  For 
he  was  a  stranger  and  she  had  given  him  no  right 
to  believe  that  she  even  liked  him.  But  he  could 
feel  no  shame.  Had  he  really  thought  that  she 
could  love  him?  Had  it  not  been  only  that  he 
wanted  to  tell  her  that  he  loved  her,  and  had 
wanted  her,  as  it  were,  to  keep  him  safe?  He  found 
himself  trying  to  explain  this  to  her,  —  not  plead 
ing, —  only  so  that  she  should  not  be  angry.  "I 
had  to  tell  you.  You'd  done  me  so  much  good. 
Everything  came  different.  Really,  I'm  not  so 
presumptuous.  I  never  meant  to  ask  anything." 

But  she  was  not  angry.  "Forgive  me,"  she  said. 
"I  hardly  know  what  I  am  saying.  You  so  aston 
ished  me.  Forgive  me.  But  I  don't  feel  as  if  I 
knew  you  at  all.  Please  don't  think  me  reproaching 
you.  I  begin  to  understand.  You  are  not  at  all 
strong.  It  was  like  the  other  day  when  you  cried, 
I  mean  —  I  feel  sure  you  think  you  care  for  me; 
but  you  could  n't  have  said  it,  when  we  know  each 
other  so  little,  if  you  had  been  well." 

She  was  putting  it  aside,  for  his  sake,  as  an  aber 
ration,  and  he  really  smiled  a  little  as  he  shook  his 
head.  "No;  really,  really,  it's  not  that;  not  be 
cause  I've  been  on  edge  and  ill.  It  was  something 
that  came  to  me  from  what  you  are;  something 
that's  been  coming  ever  since  I  saw  you.  I  know 
that  I  am  nothing  to  you;  but  for  a  moment,  just 
now,  it  seemed,  when  I  had  received  so  much,  that 
you  must  know  what  you  had  given;  it  seemed  that 

[318] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

a  person  to  whom  so  much  could  be  given,  could 
not  be  so  far  away.  But  even  then  I  saw  quite 
clearly  what  you  saw  in  me;  a  vain,  pretentious, 
emotional  creature;  insincere,  too,  and  proud  of 
my  suffering.  I  am  that.  But  I  had  never  seen  it 
before.  And  when  it  came  to  me  from  you  and, 
instead  of  crushing  me,  lifted  me  up,  I  knew  that  I 
loved  you.  —  No;  I  won't  try  to  explain.  Only 
you  do  forgive  me?  You  will  let  me  go  on  as  if  it 
had  n't  happened?  I  promise  you  that  I'll  never 
trouble  you  again." 

Oh,  the  gentleness,  the  heavenly  gentleness! 
It  breathed  through  him  like  the  colour  of  the 
crocuses,  although  she  was  as  impersonal,  as 
untouched,  and  as  mysterious  as  they.  He  was 
nothing  to  her  —  nothing;  but  she  stood  before 
him,  looking  at  him,  and  though  she  gave  noth 
ing  but  the  gentleness,  he  knew  that  he  received 
all  that  he  needed.  It  was  enough  that  she  was 
there. 

"But  it's  7  to  be  forgiven  —  /,"  she  repeated. 
"Of  course  we  will  go  on.  Oh,  you  look  very  tired. 
Please  take  my  arm  again.  I  spoke  so  strangely  to 
you.  But  —  but — "  She  had  flushed:  for  the  first 
time  he  saw  the  colour  darken  her  face  as  if  with 
a  veil  of  pain,  and  in  her  voice  was  the  passion, 
deeper,  stiller,  tha?t  he  had  heard  a  little  while  ago 
and  that  had  enfranchised  him.  "I  am  married  — 
I  mean,  my  husband  is  dead,  but  I  am  married. 
Perhaps  you  don't  understand.  Perhaps  you  will 
some  day,  if  you  should  lose  some  one  you  love  and 
feel  them  still  your  very  life.  We  were  like  that. 
He  is  always  with  me." 

They  had  said  nothing  more  as  they  walked  up 
the  meadow  to  the  house,  his  arm  in  hers.  He  had 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

no  sense  of  loss;  rather,  from  her  last  words  to  him, 
came  a  sense  of  further  gain.  She  would  be  like 
that.  He  saw  now  that  her  peace,  against  which 
he  had  pressed  and  protested,  was  something  won, 
was  depth,  not  emptiness.  She,  too,  had  lost  and 
suffered.  She  was  made  dearer  to  him,  more  sacred. 
As  for  his  love,  it  did  not  belong  —  he  had  seen 
this  even  before  she  told  him  why  —  to  this  every 
day  world  to  which  he  had  returned.  But  it  was 
everything  to  have  found  it,  with  that  other  world, 
and  to  know  that  there  it  had  its  being,  its  reality, 
forever.  What  was  it  that  had  enlarged,  trans 
formed  his  life,  but  that  very  certitude  of  an  eter 
nity  where  all  good  was  secure?  He  could  not  ex 
plain  it  to  himself  in  any  words.  Words  were  the 
keys  of  temporality.  But  he  had  seen,  if  only  for 
the  few  shining  moments,  that  Ronnie  was  not  lost; 
that  nothing  had  been  in  vain. 

If  he  found  no  difficulty,  it  was  evident  to  him 
that  Mrs.  Baldwin  felt  none,  and  he  was  glad  to 
believe  that  this  might  be  because  he  showed  her 
so  completely,  in  his  candid  contentment,  that  he 
would  never  trouble  her  again.  She  was  not  more 
kind  to  him;  but  she  took,  perhaps,  even  more  care, 
as  if  feeling  that  she  had  miscalculated  something 
in  his  recovery.  She  inaugurated  a  glass  of  hot 
milk,  instead  of  spiced  hot  water,  at  bedtime,  and 
a  rest  on  the  sofa,  with  a  rug,  before  the  midday 
dinner.  "You  will  look  so  much  better  when  you 
go  back  than  when  you  came,"  she  said. 

For  the  time  of  going  back  drew  near,  and  he  did 
not  dread  it,  though  loving  Thatches  and  all  it 
meant  more  and  more  with  every  day.  But  of 
course,  even  in  the  temporal  world,  he  was  not  to 
lose  Thatches.  That  was  quite  understood  between 

[  320  ] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

them.  The  P.G.  would  be  welcome  whenever  he 
cared  to  come. 

V 

HE  was  playing  chess  on  the  afternoon  before  his 
departure.  Tea  was  over  and  Mrs.  Baldwin  had 
gone  out.  Guy  had  noticed  that  she  had  been  per 
haps  a  little  stiller  than  usual  that  day,  when  he 
had  seen  her,  and  that  he  had  seen  her  little.  The 
game  did  not  go  very  well;  they  were  neither  of 
them  keen  on  it;  and  when  the  old  gentleman  had 
won  an  easy  victory,  he  leaned  back  in  his  chair, 
the  board  still  on  its  little  table  between  them,  and 
said,  "Poor  Erne!  She's  still  in  the  church,  or  in 
the  churchyard,  I  expect." 

Guy  felt  the  shock  of  a  great  surprise.  Strangely 
enough,  though  Mrs.  Baldwin  had  spoken  of  her 
husband  and  of  his  death,  and  though  his  books 
were  there,  he  did  not  associate  him  with  Thatches, 
nor  with  the  churchyard.  And  with  the  word, 
"churchyard,"  a  painful  anxiety  rose  in  him. 

"Is  it  an  anniversary?"  he  asked. 

"Yes,"  Mr.  Haseltine  nodded,  sighing  and  rub 
bing  his  hand  over  his  head.  "September  twenty- 
ninth.  I'd  forgotten  myself  till  just  a  little  while 
ago.  Oliver  died  on  this  day.  Her  husband.  Poor 
Erne!" 

"They  lived  here?"  Guy  asked.  He  had  im 
agined  that  it  had  been  after  her  bereavement  that 
she  and  her  father  had  found  and  made  a  home  of 
Thatches. 

"Oh,  yes.  They  lived  here.  All  their  married 
life,"  said  Mr.  Haseltine.  "Ten  years  or  so.  It 
was  a  great  love-match.  They  were  very  happy. 
I  never  saw  a  happier  couple  —  until  the  end." 

[321 1 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

"Did  anything  part  them?" 

Mr.  Haseltine  had  put  his  hands  into  his  pockets 
and  was  gazing  at  the  board  as  if  with  a  painful 
concentration,  and  though  he  shook  his  head  he 
answered,  "It  was  the  malady.  Cancer,  you  know. 
Cancer  of  the  face.  Such  a  handsome  fellow,  too: 
beautiful,  bright,  smiling  eyes;  beautiful  mouth. 
All  gone.  All  disfigured,  cruelly  disfigured,  and 
with  horrible  suffering." 

Guy  felt  his  breath  coming  thickly.  "Was  it 
long?"  he  asked. 

"Yes.  Long.  Eighteen  months,  I  think.  Mor 
phia  did  little  good  at  last.  He  could  n't  swallow; 
could  hardly  speak;  begged  to  be  killed  and  put 
out  of  his  torment.  She  was  with  him  in  it  all.  She 
never  left  him,  day  or  night;  nor  could  he  have 
borne  it  if  she  had.  Nothing  quieted  him  except 
her  hand  in  his.  But  at  the  end,"  said  Mr.  Hasel 
tine,  pushing  away  the  table  and  rising,  "at  the 
end,  it  attacked  his  brain  and  then  he  raved  at  her. 
She  could  n't  go  into  the  room  at  the  last." 

The  old  man,  with  step  lagging,  as  if  weighted, 
walked  away  to  the  window  and  stood  looking  out, 
while  Guy,  at  the  table,  felt  his  heart  turn  to  stone. 

"Poor  Effie!"  Mr.  Haseltine  repeated  after  a 
little  while.  He  came  back  into  the  room  and 
moved  up  and  down,  pausing  to  look  at  the  books 
and  pictures.  "She  has  never  been  the  same  since. 
For  a  long  while  we  were  afraid  she  could  n't  live. 
She  hardly  slept  for  months;  and  when  she  did 
sleep,  she  used  to  wake  crying,  crying,  always  for 
him.  When  she  became  stronger,  she  used  to  walk 
up  and  down  those  meadows,  sometimes  for  hours 
at  a  time.  Very  gentle;  no  complaint;  always  ready 
to  talk  to  people,  to  go  on  with  things  as  best  she 

[  322  ] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

could ;  but  changed ;  completely  changed.  We  speak 
very  little  of  him;  but  when  we  do,  it's  quite  natu 
rally.  She  goes  to  the  church  sometimes,  and  there 
are  always  flowers  on  his  grave;  but  I  don't  think 
she  has  any  orthodox  beliefs;  I  don't  know  that 
she  has  any  beliefs  at  all.  Still,  she  seems  helped. 
She  is  a  very  dear,  unselfish  woman;  a  dreamer, 
she  was  always  a  dreamer;  but  always  meaning 
well ;  and  she  does  good  in  her  quiet  way.  And  I 
think  she  likes  this  plan  of  having  people  come  and 
stay  and  seeing  after  them;  especially  now  that 
they  are  so  often  people  who  have  had  a  bad  time. 
Dear  me,  dear  me!"  Mr.  Haseltine  again  shook 
his  head,  stationed  again  at  the  window  and  look 
ing  out.  "You  would  hardly  have  recognized  her 
had  you  seen  her  ten  years  ago.  She  had  bright 
hair  and  a  charming  colour;  and  full  of  gaiety  and 
mischief.  You  'd  hardly  believe  it  now." 

"I'm  so  sorry,"  Guy  heard  himself  saying.  He 
remembered  that  those  were  the  words  Mrs.  Bald 
win  had  used  to  him  about  Ronnie. 

"Yes,  it's  very  sad,"  said  Mr.  Haseltine.  "Life 
is  certainly  very  difficult  for  some  of  us,  and  Erne 
has  had  her  share.  Somehow  one  does  n't  remem 
ber  it  when  one  is  with  her.  I  only  recalled  the  day 
by  chance." 

Guy  was  walking  in  the  meadows  when  Mrs. 
Baldwin  returned.  He  saw  her  in  the  garden, 
reading  the  letters  that  the  evening  post  had 
brought,  and  his  first  impulse  was  to  remove  him 
self  as  speedily  as  might  be  from  her  sight,  to  cross 
the  bridge  and  the  farther  meadow,  and  turn  into 
the  lane  that  led  away  from  it.  But  then  he  saw, 
as  he  stood  irresolute,  that  she  was  coming  down 
to  him,  and  he  stood  there,  helpless,  watching  her 

[3231 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

approach  in  the  soft  radiance  of  the  late  afternoon. 
She  wore  one  of  the  lavender-coloured  dresses  and 
the  little  knitted  jacket.  In  her  hand  were  the 
opened  letters.  Her  face  was  tranquil.  She  was,  of 
course,  unaware  of  what  had  happened  to  him. 

She  joined  him.  "You  are  having  your  last  look 
at  the  crocuses?" 

It  was  their  last  look  together.  That,  of  course, 
was  why  she  had  come,  full  of  care  and  of  kindness. 

"Yes.  Yes.  My  last  look  for  the  year."  He 
heard  that  his  voice  was  strange.  And  his  heart 
seemed  to  lie  like  a  cold  hard  block  in  his  side. 

"Are  n't  you  feeling  well?"  she  asked. 

He  walked  beside  her  in  silence.  What  could  he 
say?  But  how  was  it  possible  not  to  tell  her? 

They  had  turned  towards  the  sunset  and  came 
now  to  the  bridge.  She  was  looking  at  him,  with 
solicitude.  He  stopped  before  they  crossed. 

"I  must  say  something  to  you,"  broke  from  him. 
"I  must.  I  can't  go  away  without  your  knowing  — 
my  shame  —  my  unutterable  remorse." 

She  looked  at  him  with  the  look  he  knew  so  well. 
Kindly,  firmly,  if  with  anxiety,  she  prepared  to 
hear  him  thrust  some  new  torment  upon  her. 

"Shame?   Remorse?"  she  murmured. 

"About  my  poems.  About  my  griefs.  What  I  Ve 
said  to  you.  What  I've  given  you  to  bear.  I 
thought  I'd  borne  so  much.  I  thought  you  unfeel 
ing,  without  experience.  I  thought  I'd  been  set 
apart  —  that  all  of  us  had  been  set  apart,  who 
suffered  in  the  war.  Stop  me  at  once  if  you  won't 
hear  it  from  me.  But  your  father  told  me,  just 
now,  about  your  husband's  death." 

She  became  very  pale.  She  looked  away  from 
him,  but  she  said  nothing. 

[324] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

"That's  all,"  said  Guy  after  a  long  silence.  He 
saw  that  there  was  nothing  more  to  tell  her.  She 
had  understood. 

"Let  us  walk  up  and  down,"  said  Mrs.  Baldwin. 

They  crossed  the  bridge.  He  saw  the  stream  slid 
ing  brightly  below  them  between  the  old,  black 
planks.  In  the  farther  meadows  the  crocuses  grew 
more  thickly  and  opened  widely  their  pale  purple 
chalices. 

"We  have  all  suffered,"  said  Mrs.  Baldwin. 
"You  must  n't  have  remorse  or  shame.  Nothing  is 
harmed  between  us." 

The  horrible  stricture  around  his  heart  relaxed, 
and  as  they  went  very  slowly  up  and  down  he  felt 
his  throat  tighten  and  tears  rising,  rising  to  his 
eyes.  He  could  not  keep  them  back.  He  was  n't 
really  quite  strong  enough  for  this.  They  fell  and 
fell,  and  from  time  to  time  he  put  up  his  hand  to 
brush  them  away. 

"We  have  all  suffered,"  Mrs.  Baldwin  repeated 
gently. 

"Some,  more!  some,  more!"  he  said  brokenly. 
"Some,  most  of  all!" 

They  came  back  to  the  bridge,  but  though  they 
crossed  over,  they  did  not  pass  out  through  the 
high  gate  that  barred  the  other  end.  The  gate  was 
closed,  and  Guy  stopped  at  it  and  leaned  on  it  and 
put  his  face  on  his  hands.  Mrs.  Baldwin  stood  at 
the  gatepost  beside  him,  her  hand  holding  it  and 
her  head  leaned  against  her  hand. 

"He  would  have  liked  you,"  she  said.  "He  was 
so  interested  in  young  men,  young  poets.  He  was 
not  old  himself;  and  he  wrote,  too,  did  you  know? 
All  those  books  in  the  living-room  are  his.  He  used 
to  work  there.  I  will  give  you  his  two  books  if  you 

[325] 


AUTUMN  CROCUSES 

care  to  have  them.  They  were  thought  very  good; 
I  think  you  will  like  them.  —  It  was  because  of  the 
crocuses  we  came  here,"  she  went  on.  "We  found 
them  one  September,  just  like  this,  and  the  three 
little  ruined  cottages,  and  we  knew  at  once  that 
we  must  live  here.  He  so  loved  them.  When  he 
was  very  ill  —  but  before  the  very  end  when  noth 
ing  could  come  to  him  any  longer,  when  he  was 
quite  shut  away  —  he  used  to  lie  at  the  window 
and  look  out  at  them  —  that  big  window  above 
the  living-room." 

Divinely  she  was  helping  him.  It  was  as  if,  tak 
ing  him  by  the  hand,  she  led  him  again  away  from 
his  darkness  and  into  her  own  light. 

Yes,  brokenly  it  came  to  him,  it  was  there,  se 
cure;  how  won,  he  knew  not.  Through  her  he  had 
found  it;  but  that  was  because  her  feet  had  passed 
before  him  up  the  calvary.  She  had  gone  through 
everything;  and  she  knew  everything. 

And,  to  his  new  hearing,  something  of  the  infin 
ite  weariness  of  that  ascent  was  in  her  voice  when 
she  next  spoke,  although  it  was  a  voice  as  peaceful 
as  the  evening  air  around  them.  "Are  they  not 
beautiful?"  she  said. 

He  raised  his  head  and  looked  at  the  flowers 
through  his  tears.  They  had  never  been  so  beauti 
ful.  "They  make  me  think  of  you,"  he  told  her. 

"Do  they?"  Mrs.  Baldwin  still  leaned  her  head 
against  her  hand,  still  looked  out  over  the  mead 
ows.  "But  there  are  so  many  of  them,"  she  said. 
"So  many.  That  is  what  I  feel  first  of  all  about 
them.  I  could  not  think  of  them  as  like  one  person. 
Multitudes.  Multitudes.  —  And  so  silent!  They 
make  me  think  always  of  the  souls  of  the  happy 
dead." 


CAMBRIDGE  .  MASSACHUSETTS 
U    .    S    .    A 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE  LAST  DATE 
STAMPED  BELOW 


AN     INITIAL    FINE    OF    25     CENTS 

WILL  BE  ASSESSED  FOR  FAILURE  TO  RETURN 
THIS  BOOK  ON  THE  DATE  DUE.  THE  PENALTY 
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DAY  AND  TO  $I.OO  ON  THE  SEVENTH  DAY 
OVERDUE. 


SEP 

DEC    -71 

DEC  19  193 
< 

JAN    9   J947 

14Jun'49TJ 


.  D  L.L 


161960 


LD  21-50m-l,'35 


' 


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